XF Alphabet
by isadub
Summary: From A to Z, some short stories about Mulder and Scully.
1. A as Alienation

A as Alienation

* * *

When she entered the kitchen, Mulder standing still and lost in thoughts in front of the window, Scully noticed the steaming mug he was holding in an unusual way, as if it was a chalice.

"Hey, good morning, early bird... Found your old Spooky Alien coffee mug ? Any special occasion to bring it back ?"

Turning his head towards Scully, Mulder replied, "Mmm... Somehow, through its physical contact, I wanted to feel again all the weight, the significance, the sensations of my former alienation at the Bureau."

"All that in a nerd coffee mug ?"

"It's a symbol, Scully, a metaphor. I was the stranger, the alien, the weirdo, the spooky man in the basement. It wasn't trendy, you know, back in the days, to be a jerk."

"Nowadays, you miss it ?"

"Maybe... Don't really know... It was actually the point, to think about it, by holding this cup, putting my lips on it, and tasting it. Cheers, Scully!"

Then, using ceremonious gestures, Mulder sipped his still too hot coffee.

"Ouch ! Dammit !"

The Alien mug fell down, and broke into small pieces. Scully sighed at first, staring at the dead memorabilia and thinking of an appropriate wisecrack to say, when she raised her head. Mulder was in a terrible pain, his right hand on his jaw.

'Mulder, you have to face it", Scully said with her severe MD tone while softly squeezing his left hand, "you MUST go to a dentist. You can't delay it anymore. I'm right away scheduling an appointment for you, and if necessary I'd carry you on my back and drag you to the dentist chair."

Then she stepped back to reach her phone, leaving Mulder in the kitchen, unable to move one single muscle as if he has gazed into Medusa's eyes.

* * *

It came first insidiously, like an immaterial impression in his whole brain. Slowly, the sensation focused on his vision area, bringing radiance and brightness. Soon, he was surrounded by this otherworldly incandescence and felt the need to escape it. He couldn't. He was tied, lying on stone.

Then, all of a sudden, his whole body was just agony, distress and torture. His five senses were just stimulated by the most excruciating procedures he could have ever imagined, or, if he could have formulated it, in a way he didn't want to relive.

"No ! Scully ! Scully !"

He jolted awake abruptly, moaning in pain and completely soaked with sweat. He touched anxiously his chest, wrists and ankles with his two hands, and checked his mouth and teeth with his tongue. Scully was already pulling him down her chest, embracing and wrapping his whole body into hers as tight as she could. Immediately, Mulder's anguish turned into a continuous flow of tears flooding his cheeks and Scully's breast.

"You'll be fine, Mulder. I'll be with you. We won't let these extraterrestrial bastards haunting you in your dreams or in your daily life. We won't let them alienate you from your health care."


	2. B as Boat

**B as Boat **

Finally, after the last tense and stressful events, they were able to settle down, breathe and rest.

Finally, after struggling to stay alive without injuries, they lied down side by side and closed their eyes.

Finally, Mulder was in a mood to launch some wisecracks.

"Scully, we are now literally in the same boat, till death do us part. Don't you think it's time to make our vows ?"

"Mulder...", replied Scully, eyes still closed.

"It's just sink or swim. I wonder what I'd choose. And you?"

"Mulder...", replied Scully, opening her eyes and slightly smiling.

"Come on, Scully. Or would I call you Starbuck? By the way, I'd give an arm and a leg to encounter right now an appealing twin-tailed mermaid and order her a double shot cappuccino with extra foam. No, actually, just a leg... I could have a peg leg."

"Mulder...", replied Scully with a large smile. She turned her head, stared at him a few seconds and grabbed his hand. "You're right, we have to relax a moment. There's nothing else useful we can do just now. And stop dreaming of a peg leg, you're too old for that."

Then, leaning forward she kissed him tenderly and claimed, "I, Dana Katherine Scully, promise to you, Fox William Mulder, to take care of you, to protect you, to support you, to cherish you in this frail lifeboat till a rescue team saves us."

"Okay", replied Mulder, "not necessary to make big plans for a lifetime. Let's just live in the moment. Come closer and let's snuggle together."

* * *

A moment later, Scully was meticulously studying the rescue manual, while Mulder was enjoying unpacking the fishing kit.

"Scully, stop hitting the books and join the Fishing Scouts Group ! We need extra hands and a pretty lure by there!", yelled Mulder.

"Shut up, Mulder. Right now, everything is okay but we don't know how many time we'll be stuck in here and what the ocean is plotting against us. We have to be prepared."

"I know, I know, Captain. We aren't on Pacific Princess. However, isn't it a pretty Love Boat, honey ?" said Mulder, winking and sending a kiss to Scully. "Hey, Doc Bricker, can I have another anti-seasickness pill ?"

"Not yet, Mulder."

"You sure, Doc?"

Mulder didn't wait for an answer and resumed his fishing experiments with temperate gestures. Suddenly, his tone became serious, with a touch of anxiety.

"Scully... I'm not a sailor... Poseidon doesn't like me... By the past I've been through a lot on boats. I used to almost die on ships. I really rely on you to keep me alive. To keep us alive. It's why I try to keep calm fishing or trying to make you smile."

Then, with a crack in his voice he said shyly, "I have to confess, Scully... I'm... uh... quite frightened... by all this mysterious deep water."

Scully put her book down and stared at him with the most tender look. Mulder was holding her gaze, his eyes slightly wet. Their visual exchange lingered long enough to allow time for all their feelings, thoughts and comprehension to travel through the air. Eventually, Mulder's heaviness flew away, but he remained earnest.

"Scully, if we had to spend more time than planned in this hostile space, I want you to be the survivor. You are even allowed to cannibalize me if required. You're the MD, you would know exactly what parts to take, and when throw my rotten body away."

"Mulder, no!", protested Scully.

"Scully, yes. But promise me to give me all the seasickness pills I'd need. And now, get ready to cook some sushi!"

* * *

After a few hours of quietness and bright daylight on the lifeboat, there was now no doubt that the twilight would come faster than expected, bringing soon insecurity, concern and angst. No sign of a rescue team yet, no sign of another life form -even fishes-, they were completely alone with no means of communication.

Scully, who had kept her mind and hands busy while taking care of Mulder's mood, was now feeling uncomfortable and was wriggling in her sitting position. Mulder looked at her with an amused smile.

"Scully, you have to answer the call of nature. Before the night. It's very annoying they have forgotten the toilets in our room. Good news is that there's no Peeping Tom out there."

At least, this quite funny moment of gymnastics and loosening distracted them from more serious worries.

"I wonder if we have ever been in so deep intimacy before, Scully", said Mulder. "There's nothing we can hide long from each other in such a tiny rough place."

"Even our intimate thoughts ?", replied Scully.

"Yes. They couldn't stay wandering in our minds, they would have to go out, one way or another. Scully, the vows you made earlier, I've taken them very seriously."

"Really ?"

"Yep. Us in this lifeboat is just us in our lives on this damn planet. Alone, threatened by random and mysterious forces we cannot control, we are bound to be close-knit partners, to fight by ourselves and sometimes expecting a Deus Ex Machina to save us. Even if we wanted to, we couldn't escape from each other."

Dusk was now falling, bringing spectacular and marvelous colors upon them.

"Scully, I think we'll have a beautiful starry night. We'll wait for falling stars, and then I'll make vows for you."

Scully was about to reply sweet and loving thoughts, when she glimpsed dark sinister clouds and waters. The way Mulder was installed prevented him to see the threat coming upon them. She will have to distract and relax him, them, for a while. Their fate will come soon enough.

"Hey, Mulder, before the stars, can we go back on our case?"

"Sure, Scully. Since our shipwreck we didn't take time to gather the evidence."

"Evidence? Mulder, we lost all we had. As always, we have nothing left, nothing concrete. It will be an inconclusive case."

"But, Scully, the Kraken? You saw it?"

"No, Mulder. And my theory is still valid. I can explain scientifically what happened..."

And then, they entered in their familiar back and forth.


	3. C as Cows

C as COWS

_Late afternoon_

(Mulder)

I know perfectly that Scully sent me away all day on a flimsy pretext. But I've done what she expected me to do. And as I'm coming back to the basement with almost nothing to enlighten our boring current X case, I'm pleased to have done my duty. I'm sure she's on something. What, I've no clue. I didn't want to know nor to investigate. It's surely work-related, for she wouldn't want me right now in the basement. Scully is too reluctant to cross lines. These days, I've seen glints in her eyes, little smiles in unexpected moments, and a whole lightness she couldn't hide. Too many times I've sensed her insistent glances when I turned my back. Last night I've felt new paths on my body followed by her fingers and her mouth. This morning I've perceived a thrill on her skin as we kissed. That was evidence... Evidence of a surprise to come when I'm entering our office. That it. I'm in front of the door. It's closed. No sounds. Maybe I could tease her being a bit too late... Pointless. She surely has heard me arriving.

(Scully)

I'm not skilled to schedule a very early/late birthday present or to celebrate an unexpected dog years birthday. I'm no Mulder. Unexpectedly, I came recently onto something that triggered me. A way to surprise Mulder. Our X cases were so boring these last months! I've done all I could to be discreet, to gather evidence, to collect the equipment needed, to find a way to keep him away. I know that he's no fooled, that he has sensed I was planning something for him. It doesn't matter, he has played along, saying and expressing nothing, at least not consciously. He doesn't know, but he has had slightly unusual gestures or words, or a way to look at me inquisitively without pretending to do so. I wonder what he has guessed... Oh, that it. I can hear his footstep. Not his usual way to walk, of course. Well...

_One hour later_

(Mulder)

It happened so quickly that I even don't know how she managed it. As soon as I was stepping in the office I was blindfolded. But I could smell and I could hear. So, as she was seating me, I knew that she would use an old-school slide-projector. Ours? How did she get it? Don't know, didn't ask yet.

And then, she showed off. The first thing I noticed was her cowboy hat and the sheriff's coat. Yep, the buck teeth sheriff's coat... I'm sure of that. She had kept it. Then, half of my brain became wild, unmanageable, incapable of focusing and thinking straight. The other half tried to keep cool, to listened to her, to watch the screen, to look at the files she showed me. I recognized my old photos. Exsanguinated cows. Cattle mutilations. Different cases I've studied long time ago. Old X Files. There were also new pictures, new evidence, new cases. I heard a lot of words, theories, hypothesis, clues, tests... It was indeed a surprise. A surprise which stunned me.

(Scully)

In retrospect, I think I've done too much. I wanted to impress him. And to put him in a Texan mood. It was appropriate, dealing with cows. He was really surprised when he saw the old slides. But he has a way to bring back his look at me again and again... It was weird. I wanted to show him straight all the evidence I had gathered. I didn't want him to interrupt me. I wanted to overwhelm him by all the new clues I've found. It would be one-shot without interruption. He would be amazed, and in the end he would promptly book a flight to investigate and corroborate the unbelievable theories I've elaborated. I had worked hard, had done researches, autopsies, had performed scientific analysis, analyzed in detail his old files. He was indeed surprised. But what stunned me was his unexpected reaction.

_The Truth_

When Scully ended up her presentation nothing happened during almost one minute. Sixty seconds of a sudden silence, of the stillness of their bodies. Except Mulder's eyes. They were unsettled, unfixed, moving from the screen to Scully's eyes, hands, body, then the office, and repeating the movements again and again. Scully waited for another Mulder's reaction, more explicit and verbal. She didn't want to speak first.

"Holy Cow, Scully!", yelled at last Mulder.

Scully was about to reply when Mulder stood up and stepped quickly forward her. Her words get lost in her mouth as she still wanting to let him react first.

Mulder, who was now standing close to Scully, took the files she was still holding, threw them down, picked up her hat, put it on his own head and whispered slowly in her left ear.

"Scully. You turned me on. And this coat. It's like a red rag to the bull."

That is essentially how they crossed a huge red line in the office this day.

* * *

NOTE: Inspired by the wonderful episode _Bad Blood_, of course!


	4. D as Dream

**D as Dream**

* * *

Mulder was cutting out articles from magazines. There were pictures of strange beasts, frightening monsters, blurry UFOs and aliens, disturbing photos of genetic tools, manipulations and mutants, all outlined by nonsense weird headlines. It seemed that he was cutting frantically and endlessly, scattered papers and magazines covering the whole floor around him. He was himself sit on the carpet, head down, completely focused on his repetitive gestures.

"Fox, what are you doing to MY magazines with MY scissors in MY bedroom?", screamed young Samantha who had burst into the room.

"What... No... it's not true", muttered a surprised Mulder. Samantha rushed into him, snatching scissors and magazines from his hands.

"You're SO mean! Get out of MY room!", yelled Samantha.

As Mulder -completely stunned and disoriented- didn't move, Samantha grabbed his hair and pulled as hard as she could.

"Ouch!" cried Mulder. Eyes closed by pain he suddenly stood up, touching his head where he could now feel a patch of hairless skin.

Holding his breath and anger, he opened quietly his eyes. The whole room was spinning around him, all the papers floating in the air, dancing in circles. He was surrounded by a surreal brightness preventing him from seeing anything else.

Unbalanced, unable to move, he managed to shout loudly, "Samantha? I'm sorry! Samantha, where are you ?"

The only answer he received was his echoed distorted words reverberating from all directions. Feeling queasy and dazzled he closed once again his eyes. Soon, an outright silence enveloped him, the piercing brightness disappeared, and he retrieved his sight and balance.

Whereas the scenery has completely changed, Mulder didn't look surprised. He also seemed to have completely forgotten his sister, his thoughts being now focused on the strange helix staircase raising up just in front of his feet. The whole structure was made of agglomerated papers and magazines -he could recognize part of the pictures he had cut-, nevertheless the construction somehow appeared solid and secure. Compelled to climb, Mulder began to put cautiously his feet one by one on the stairs. The steps were shaped as four giant letters A, T, G and C, the letter A being always paired with the T, the G with the C. After a few meters, he reached a first level, a tiny platform where he could stand in front of a human-size mirror. The first glimpse on the mirror gave him his usual reflection. Then, just on his mirrored head, small ripples surfaced, shapeshifting his face and hair into another person. He could still distinguish some of his own features, but they were melted with other ones. The hair weren't his and that's how he recognized the second face mixed with his.

"Deep Throat?", questioned Mulder out loud. He obtained no answers.

Nothing happening beyond this vision, Mulder resumed his ascension. After climbing a few meters, he reached a second similar platform. The same phenomena occurred, though, this time, he identified immediately his father Bill. He didn't say anything, feeling a lump in his throat. He touched the mirror, following the outlines of the strange face. He couldn't bear staying long in front of this hybrid, so he moved on. And then again... platforms. He left promptly the third, as soon as CSM made an apparition, and spent more time on the fourth. He was smiling while touching his own scalp, the sensation not matching the visual. He had indeed inherited Skinner's bald head. "Would Scully appreciate it?", thought Mulder, regaining a light heart.

Strangely, the fifth level was further than the previous ones. He was beginning to question the reality surrounding him when he reached it. The mirror was there lower and smaller, reflecting only his torso. He felt compelled to cross his arms on his chest. Once the gesture achieved, a baby materialized in his arms. Of course he wasn't just a baby, he was his baby. A vision he had never forgotten.

* * *

As Mulder waked up in the middle of the night, Scully was already aware that he had a perturbing dream. His worse nightmares were recurrent, if not frequent, and Scully's body and mind had learned to sense them and awaken her, whenever Mulder would need her comfort. Though, this time, Mulder was not frightened to death, nor in pain, nor sweat-soaked. He was concerned and puzzled.

"What happened, Mulder?", asked Scully while gently stroking his arms.

Mulder was surprisingly able to describe quite perfectly the dream he just had. The images and feelings hadn't vanished when he waked up. Arriving at the last step scene of his story, he hesitated and decided not to tell Scully what he saw. It would be too painful for both of them.

"Mulder, as you already told me often, dreams are answers to questions we haven't yet figured out how to ask.", said Scully. "So, I think that..."

"...who's really my father? Did I win the genetic lottery? Severe or temperate baldness? Full amazing hair till my 70s?", cut off Mulder, while touching his hair, trying to retrieve the patch of naked skin of his dream.

Scully laughed at it and messed up his hair with her two hands while giving him little kisses all around his face.

Though, Mulder couldn't keep this light-hearted mood any longer. The last vision was now overwhelming him. Mulder took away Scully's hands from his hair, grasped gently her face, forcing her to look straight at him, and stared a few seconds into her eyes inquisitively.

Hesitantly, he whispered slowly, "More seriously, Scully. Have you ever done...". He paused just a moment, then shyly and anxiously, added "you know, for William... a paternity test?"


	5. E as Eyes

**E as Eyes**

* * *

... and then, in a hazardous movement meant to protect Scully, he exposed himself to the evil psychic curse. He instantly passed out.

* * *

His first sensation was a great pain in his eyes, as if many long needles were piercing his eyeballs, reaching the optic nerves and injecting poison towards his brain. Trying to avoid the pain by concentrating on the thoughts of the whats, whens, hows, he only succeeded to bring back vague images and feelings of the foolish previous events. The effort became soon useless and, weakened and tired, he could no longer control his mind. A unique picture was forcing his way in his visual cortex and stayed, repelling all the earlier images. It was his sister Samantha, in her night dress and levitating in the air, surrounded by a blank brightness.

"Samantha! No!", muttered Mulder, laying in an hospital bed.

As she was dozing in a chair beside him, she didn't understand his words, but she instantly stood up to check him.

"Mulder, it's me", whispered softly Scully in his left ear. "Don't worry, you're okay. Your vitals are good."

Hearing her gave him immediately a great relief, psychologically and physically. He retrieved a normal voice if not a normal cortex.

"Scully... Where I am? What happened?"

"You're in an hospital. You're fine, I'm fine. Don't worry."

"Scully... What happened?"

"Can you feel one of my hand in yours? The other on your face? Concentrate on your senses."

Mulder was puzzled. Why Scully didn't really answer him? She has explained nothing to him. What was the meaning of her last words? His senses? Yes, if he payed attention, he could feel her on his skin, he could smell her scent. These sweet feelings made him smile, his body relax even more. Scully's thumb slid slowly from his cheeks to his lips, entered slightly in his mouth, reached his tongue. Yes, he could taste her perfectly. Though, there was a problem...

"Scully... Why can't I see you? Scully?" worried Mulder.

"Mulder... Listen carefully to me. We indeed think that you have anomalies affecting your visual perceptions, but the mechanism is not well understood and explained. There's nothing we can do yet. I want you to focus on your other senses. You'd have to be very patient."

"Scully... What do you mean? Am I blind?"

"In a way, I'm afraid... But it's surely temporary. A matter of days, or weeks... I can't say more."

Mulder tried to process the informations Scully gave him and relate them to the case they were investigating when the events occurred. Once again, pain, needles, brightness, Samantha, confusion were brought back, invading his brain and obscuring his thoughts. Even speaking a few words became more difficult.

"Scully... I don't understand... The curse... A painful image... forcing his way through my mind... Samantha..."

"You have to forget these things, I can't discuss them with you. You have to concentrate only on your immediate environment. Listen to me, sense me, just feel. Don't think too much."

* * *

She was still awake, cuddling him in her arms and watching over his sleep. It had been ten days since he came back home, since she had to take care of him the whole days and nights. She was tired by lack of sleep and lack of work on her imposed sick leave, upset that she couldn't figure out what really happened to Mulder as a MD, an investigator, a scientific, and even a partner. However, there were enough good sides in this ordeal to sustain her, actually both of them. They just had to let go all thoughts and worries, forget the case, just live in the moment, just share the daily intimacy of a regular couple and enjoy their endless sensual intercourses. For this was the empirical cure prescribed.

In the morning, sitting on the porch and drinking coffee, she was resting and meditating. The last night had been quieter than the previous ones, and the day before there were tiny signs that Mulder was recovering, even though no improvement seemed to occur concerning his sight. This blindness was of course the hardest element to manage, for both of them. But, just now, Scully welcomed this peaceful moment, rays of sunlight warming her face, closing her eyes. She was deeply breathing in some fresh air when she felt a warm radiance coming from behind her, touching her back and the bottom of her head. She held her breath a few seconds experiencing and enjoying that amazing sensation she hadn't felt for too long.

And then, without moving her head, she whispered, "Mulder, you awake? So... you have recovered your eyesight?"

"How do you know I'm here? I came to you very silently. You couldn't hear me. And how the hell can you guess for my eyes?", replied Mulder with an amused smiled.

Scully turned over and met his eyes.

"Mulder, I can always feel you when you gaze at me."


	6. F as Flight

**F as Flight**

If you were one of those birds of prey daring to fly above these dark woods, you would notice that something unusual was happening down on the spot you were used to avoid. Circling around the sinister ruins mingled with a wild vegetation, you would catch sight of strange movements on the ground level and see two chaotic groups of unidentified beings running away from the threatening center. And then, focusing with your eagle eyes on these two moving masses -one heading plain West the other plain East- you would be able to recognize two humans chased by wild unearthly animals you've never seen before.

If you were one of the flies trying to keep turning around two sweaty and smelly human beings, you would know that the one heading to the sunset was a red-haired woman, and the other moving in the exact opposite direction was a tall man. But if you were a fly you would certainly be more attracted by the strange dark forms shaped as tough dogs, red eyes glowing in the shadows, enthralled by their heavy deathly stink. You would then rejoin the horde of the monstrous flying bugs following these horrific beasts. Though, you would have a hard time to keep the quick pace, for this was a survival race...

...For the woman was running fast, in long identical strides despite her petite stature. You could tell she was a true runner, that she had trained regularly during so many years, that she was still an athlete despite her middle-age. Her whole body and mind were committed to the race in the forest, for that was a matter of death or life. Nothing else distracted her, not even her fear, not even her desperate situation, not even the loss of her partner, for she was only controlled by her primitive brain. On the opposite direction, as if they were two opposite poles of a compass needle, the man was also running away, escaping death. You could notice that his race was less efficient despite his tall legs, for his strides were slightly irregular. For he was more vulnerable, for a taste of pure fear has tainted his mind, for he had let worries about his partner penetrate too deeply his thoughts.

* * *

She didn't know how long she had run when her first conscious thoughts emerged in her brain. Still, they were focused on her own condition, as if thinking on a larger scale would make her miss a step.

"Run, jump, avoid obstacles... Don't look back, forget you have no more gun... Run, breathe...

Reach the end of these woods, reach civilization, I'll be safe... Can do it, don't weaken... I see the edges of the forest... Can do it, don't weaken..."

These were her primitive words of hopefulness.

"Run, escape, flee... Can do it... When I'll be there, I'll be safe... When I'll be there, I could continue to run, escape, flee... Run, escape, flee..."

Saying these three last words a few time as a mantra made her feel lighter, as if these specific words allowed her to throw away weight stones she had to carry for so long.

"Run, escape, flee... I could flee definitively this time, run away from the darkness, from the troubles. I have fled once, I can do it again. Run, escape, flee... I could have a normal life. Run, escape, flee... I can get free... Far away, I would be light... So light I could fly in the air. Run, escape, flee... "

And, indeed, her race became aerial and weightless, her feet seeming to glide over the irregular ground.

Meanwhile, the mind of her partner was very confused, reflecting his state of panic. He couldn't help looking back at his evil pursuers, and that was useless and unfortunate. For that was just undermining his psychological strength.

"Scully... Where are you?... Maybe she's safe... She managed to escape... She'll be safe... She has to flee... to flee all things... Scully... Leave me behind... They are on me, not you... You deserve a normal life..."

And then he stopped and faced the monsters.

"Come on, fucking bastards!"

Watching the foolish gesture at this moment you wouldn't have bet on him against the beasts.

But, unexpectedly, you would have seen him resume his run, strengthen and intensify his pace. For now he has a new goal, allow her partner to flee and let all the darkness chasing him.

* * *

A few minutes later, Scully felt a harsh stitch on her belly's left side, making her stop abruptly. The sharp pain was unbearable and soon spread upon her heart, squeezing it with an overwhelming pressure. Suddenly, as if the ache has awaken her, her true self came out.

"Mulder! Mulder!"

The unexpected revelation overpowered all the fibers and cells of her muscles, all the neurons and axons of her nervous system. She resumed her race with a new trajectory, turning straight to the South. A single word was now triggering her.

"Mulder!"

At the same instant Mulder felt a warm and well-known sensation in his guts. He knew instinctively what to do, where to go. He has to head South as a North magnet pole being attracted by its opposite.

* * *

Mulder was the first to see the brightness in the sky, the indiscernible moving structure appearing not so far away beyond the high trees.

"At least I could be rescued by a flying saucer", thought Mulder.

He then put all his strengths to reach as fast as he could the surreal lights that came from the sky through the forest. At least, he could fight the monsters in the glimmer or be abducted by aliens.

* * *

Even from his hover flight above them, even overseeing the whole rescue operation from his chopper, Skinner wouldn't be able to describe what happened in details.

The situation was so confused on the ground, the chain of events so improbable and miraculous, that he would only be grateful to the providence to have been -once again- the Deus ex machina in the midst of an evil darkness.

As they are lifting off the ground, hung tight together in the rescue net, Mulder and Scully wouldn't know neither how they had eventually escaped. There were some injuries, wounds and blood -especially on Mulder's skin as he was the one who had fought the most the monstrous beasts-, but they were safe. There were a lot of confusion in their mind and thoughts, but only relief and recognition were expressed in their eyes as they stared into each other's.

"Mulder, I... I'm awful... When... I was fleeing... I was about to...", whispered Scully in a broken voice, as some unpleasant memories of her solitary escape were resurfacing.

"...No, Scully", interrupted Mulder, "forget your previous flight."

"Look, we are together now, flying in the air. Look, isn't it a wonderful romantic flight?", said a smiling Mulder, showing to Scully beautiful purple and pink clouds in the sunset.


	7. G as Ghosts

_Notes:_ This chapter will have a sequel, the next chapter. It will be titled "H as Haunted".

**G as Ghosts**

"Here it starts", Scully mumbles to herself, just after her sudden scream and gasp.

Since that bloody night decades ago, all along this years working and living beside or not far from him, Scully has learned to deal with the seasonal emergence of Mulder's subtle ghostly whims. Since that scary Eve night in 1998, almost every year when Halloween completely fades out and before Christmas celebrations, Scully witnesses signs of his peculiar spooky obsession. Throughout all these weeks and days lacking warmth and daylight, all these weeks and days easily hatred for their grey and rainy skies, at unexpected moments and without warnings, Mulder warms her up with his pranks and jokes, or deeply moves her by his romantic star-crossed lovers tales.

"Stop it, Mulder. You scared me. It's enough!", Scully chuckles while fighting with his arms and hands, trying to steal his flashlight.

It's usually the first sign, his first move. His classic creepy flashlight under the chin that catches her every time and gives her the heebie-jeebies. From that starting point, he would do or tell crazy things every now and then, making completely nonsense to someone who doesn't know the truth, his truth. They have never really discussed it, but Scully knows that their confrontation with Maurice and Lyda, all the disturbing feelings they had experienced that night and their finally happy and joyful ending, had left pleasant meaningful scars and memories in Mulder's heart and soul. Yes, they don't know for sure what had happened this night. Yes, they almost shot each other. Yes, they were frightened to death. Yes, their psyches were deeply shaken by the two accurate spectral shrinks. Whereas Scully would not particularly want to relive these upsetting emotions, the truth is that Mulder would remain faithful and grateful to Maurice and Lyda's brutal life lesson.

"Mulder, I'm aging. Are you sure it's a good idea to scare me to death like that anymore?", Scully whispers in his right ear, maintaining his both hands above his head on the floor with her whole strength. They are now lying on the floor, her on top of him, after their lighthearted fight. Surrounded by shadows as the flashlight has vanished far away along the corridor, Mulder only answers to her by a sweet deep kiss and regular soft hips moves.

(To be continued...)


	8. H as Haunted

_Notes:_ This chapter is the sequel of the previous one, G as Ghosts, and will have a sequel, the next chapter. It will be titled "I as Incorporeal".

**H as Haunted**

Only a few seconds later, Mulder savors the power of the sensual answer he has made to Scully. Her muscles are already weakening above him, her hands are loosing their grips as her fingers are willing to slide on his forearms, and he can feel every inches of her inner and outer body completely melting. Taking advantage of her feebleness, he flips their position in a quick expert movement he's used to practice every now and then.

"We both are aging, Scully. Nevertheless, sorry, but not sorry. How could we ever stop to surprise ourselves, to make our hearts jerk into our chests and beat in crazy rhythms?", Mulder whispers on Scully's lips. He then picks up her left hand and places it on his chest, on the exact spot where his heart is knocking so hard and so frantically.

None of them is now able to move or to speak, they are just locking eyes and enjoying these endless seconds that are emphasized by Mulder's loud heartbeat.

A slight move in the far end of the corridor wrapped in the shadows catches Mulder's vision. He raises his head, squints his eyes, then smiles at the mirroring apparition and nods slowly his head.

"What? Mulder? Have you seen a ghost? Is it another of your prank?", Scully asks.

"Well... No... It's... I'm sorry," Mulder replies shyly, still focusing straight ahead.

"Mulder? Look at me. Is our house haunted?"

Mulder lowers his head and gives Scully his most soothing and charming smile.

"Our house will be haunted when we're dead, Scully. By us. In its walls, its floor, from the basement to the attic, we'll leave remains and relics of our unearthly bond for future paranormal archeologists and romantic ghost hunters. And we'll be the kindest ghosts and the cutest spirits of star-crossed lovers that would ever exist in the world."

"Wow... I'd love that. What about leaving a passionate trace just here?", Scully suggests in a shaky voice and with wet eyes.

"I'm totally in," Mulder replies, zeroing in now on the body and soul radiating in his arms, but not without surreptitiously glancing once more at the ethereal twin still standing further away.

(To be continued...)


	9. I as Incorporeal

_Notes:_ The end of the trilogy G,H and I.

**I as Incorporeal**

_Two weeks before - Raleigh's Cemetery, North Carolina - All Souls' Day _

Mulder has waited in his car until the sunset, and has then sneaked into the cemetery, seeking for quiet, loneliness and peacefulness. He is now seating on the moist grass, his back on a massive oak tree trunk, chewing sunflower seeds. He doesn't know where his grave was located decades ago, where exactly he was lying in his coffin deep in the ground -it doesn't really matter-. How strange, how unbelievable to have been there as a dead body and to eventually come and visit that tangible place yet haunted by imperceptible traces of his ephemeral stay.

As his right hand disappears in his seeds sack, a voice raises from behind the tree.

"Wanna share some with me?"

His upper body jerks, sending the package and almost all of its contents on the grass.

"You just can pick'em up, all of them... So I'd be safe for a while if you are what I think you could be," Mulder replies without daring looking elsewhere than at the discarded seeds.

"Wow, still able to make wits! I'm not at all a vampire, but I like chewing sunflowers seeds, or I used to like them. Don't be afraid, I'll come closer and face you," the oddly familiar voice says in a reassuring tone.

Mulder closes his eyes, focusing on his breath in a way to calm down. He decides to remain in his sitting position, afraid to faint in front of what, or who, his guts have guessed he would encounter.

"It's okay. You can open your eyes. You're safe. I'm standing a few meters away from you."

Mulder slowly raises his head, count down from ten to zero, then looks at the apparition.

"Wow! Wait a minute! Is it required to appear like that? Don't you have the decency to... to have clothes, and, well... to hide all these wounds and... holes," Mulder says, overwhelmed by the vision.

"I don't show my holes to just anyone... Just you. What you see is the exact condition in which I was found... _you _were found dead. Completely naked, and covered by dreadful alien scars. I'm sorry to inflict that truthful picture on you. I guess it's part of the process."

"The process?"

"You're here for a reason. I'm waiting for you for so many years. I'm so glad to encounter you. You still look so handsome. What are you now? Fifty how much?"

"Fifty too much... Yes, I'm in a good shape, but not as much as you are, well... without the injuries."

"There are more important things I want to know. How is she?"

"As beautiful as ever."

"Are you still... together? Together together?"

"Yes, we are, at last once again, from not so long and I hope for the rest of our lives. We had had a tough journey as a couple for so many years... Now, I want to believe that we have reached a smooth happy path, and that we'll walk along together, holding our hands and never letting go."

"So, it's surely why we finally meet. Let's figure that out... together. First, you have to tell me your life. Well, the second part of your life, when you were resurrected. I don't know anything about it. My own life stopped in the alien ship."

Then, Mulder -the actual corporeal one- narrates the events of the last 18 years to the other Mulder -the younger, the... whatever he is-. It's not easy for him to condense in a short story -even if he takes his time- all the important facts, all the failures and dramas, all the pleasure and sadness, all the powerful feelings, all the love, all the loss... For this cathartic autobiography threw out loud in a disordered way, he is mainly emphasizing the painful milestones of all these years, focusing especially on his relationship with Scully, and finally mentioning his son through tears. He would have tell more on so many things, but he stops when he realizes that the ethereal man in front of him seems overwhelmed.

"Scully had my son in her womb when I was abducted by the spaceship?"

"Indeed... Wanna some seeds to swallow the news?"

"I can't pick up and chew any. You can see me, but look at me. I'm quite translucent, I'm just an incorporeal being, a spiritual Doppleganger."

"Are you real?"

"You'll figure that out. You are still an expert of the paranormal and a psychologist, remember."

"So what? What's next?"

"It's my turn."

"Your turn?"

"Yes. To tell my story, my truth."

"Don't I know it? You are me, I am you."

"Maybe you don't remember what was your exact state of mind when you was my age. Memory is highly selective, and you, _we_, have changed. Maybe it's the point. To look into your inner previous soul and to figure out how to get along your future."

Listening to a naked ghostly twin, Mulder is reliving as if it was once again the first time, all the first truly amazing intimate steps he has done with Scully, all the passion and the sparkles that were in his heart, for a few weeks before his abduction. There were so many details that he had indeed forgotten through the passing years.

"Do you hate me for having walked through the force field in Bellefleur? Will you ever forgive me for that?", the wounded Mulder asks shyly.

"Never. There's so many other things I can forgive myself. But I'm not hating you..."

After a few minutes of quietness and stillness for both of them, Mulder picks up the sunflower seeds sack and stands up.

"Well, I think it's time I come back home, to our house. Scully will be worried if I'm too late. I didn't really tell her where I was going. Will I see you again? Will you haunt this cemetery forever?"

"I really don't know. I'm not sure of what I am."

"Well... goodbye."

After a few steps towards the gates, Mulder hears his twin calling him.

"Hey!"

Turning around, Mulder replies: "What? Do you want a ride?"

"No. I was just thinking... Maybe you'll see me again... Maybe you just have to listen fiercely to your heart."

"I'll do."

(The End)


	10. J as Jaw

**J as Jaw**

When she finally found him, sitting on the porch and facing the landscape in the sunrise, she stood still a few seconds. He hadn't heard or sensed her coming, and she didn't want to break his thoughts too abruptly. Not in that particular moment, not when she was witnessing these body gestures she had learned to notice in a flash. His eyes were closed, his right hand was slightly and slowly sliding down the middle of his chest along his ghostly scar, barely touching the sweatshirt he wore. She could only see his right side view, his perfect stubbly right cheek, but it was there that she could perceive all his inner tensions.

The muscle was prominent, hard and elongated, and would have manifested a stubborn resistance under her fingertips if she had tried to touch it. In many other circumstances she would have found it sexy as hell, as it has always been since she met him. But there were nuances in his jaw clenching, and this one was the hugely angsty one, leaving its aphrodisiac properties away.

As she had anticipated it, his jaw relaxed a few seconds later and his lips began to slightly part away and form a feeble smile. This was the signal for her to resume her movements.

"Hi! I was searching you. Aren't you freezing?", Scully asked softly while sitting close to him.

"Morning... Freezing is part of my meditation process, a way to prepare my body to the winter to come. The real winter, and you know... the metaphorical winter," Mulder replied, giving Scully a smirk on his last words.

"Don't be silly, Mulder. And stop making jokes about our ages, please," Scully said while slapping him on his upper thigh.

"Ouch!"

He took her left hand in his two ones, squeezed it, and then his fingers played a long moment -seemingly on their own will- with all parts of her delicate hand. They were both watching the sun, rising in a perfect cloudless sky, bringing out the amazingly gorgeous colors of the fall.

"We have two beautiful days off ahead, and nothing important scheduled. Would you like to visit Martha's Vineyard?", Mulder asked.

"Sure, if you want to."

"We will go to the beach in the end, and when we come back home, I will smell the iodine perfume on your hair, admire your rosy freckled cheeks that would have suffered too much wind and sun, and, last but not least, the tip of my tongue will seek every tiny grain of sand hidden in any of your folds."

"Wow, Mulder... Can't wait for this trip."

* * *

As promised, they were sitting on the beach, welcoming all the primitive and invigorating sensations the Ocean was bringing to them.

They were on Joseph Sylvia State Beach, and after being both quiet and still for a long time, Mulder was spreading out and sharing all his knowledge about the movie _Jaws_. With a lot of gestures, he was showing her where specific scenes had been filmed, while describing frame by frame some iconic parts of the movie. When he hummed the famous tense score, she stared at his mouth and his jaw, relieved to finally witness only joy and playfulness in their moves.

Previously they had visited some of his childhood related places, and whereas they were stepping into harsh or bittersweet memories, Mulder remained lighthearted. His intention was to make peace with his past and to share with Scully some details of his childhood that he was surprised to rediscover just by the magical fact to be there. Scully had scrutinized his gestures, in particular the muscles of his jaw, decoding his mood and his tensions, willing to prevent and anticipate any depressing feelings. She had seen him clenching his jaw from time to time, but nothing really alarming.

Playing now in the sand with his both hands -digging, burying, scattering and letting the grains running through his fingers-, Mulder was discoursing about the relations between _Jaws_ and _Moby Dick_. Scully was obviously more into the discussion, able to argue and enlighten his lecture. They eventually reached the memories of their conversation on a rock surrounded by the -waist height- waters of Heuvelmans Lake.

"Though, this alligator monster had really frightening jaws," Scully said softly.

Mulder perfectly heard the emotion hidden in her words.

"Scully, I am very sorry for Queequeg... And I know I have been quite an asshole at the time about him."

Scully turned her head and saw that the muscle on his right cheek was clenched. She raised her fingers and let them slide along it, the contraction weakening and becoming soft instantly. Then, she followed his perfect jaw line and reached his soft wet lips.

"Don't worry, it's okay. Do you know how hot you are when you are apologizing to me like that?"


	11. K as Killers

**K as Killers**

"Hi, what are you doing?" Mulder asked to Scully this Sunday morning. He was standing still on the threshold of their kitchen, seeing only Scully's backside. She was sitting on a chair, her hands seemingly performing technical movements.

"Hi! Just killing time taking care of our guns," Scully replied without turning her head.

Mulder moved forward quietly, slowly approaching Scully's back, his bare feet almost sliding on the floor. He couldn't reach her in heavy steps, it would have been a sacrilege towards his modern warrior goddess. Arrived behind her, he bent down to kiss the top of her head, closing his eyes and deeply inhaling her divine scent. Meanwhile, his left hand gently slid along her neck, her left shoulder and arm, then seized her heavy left breast, weighing the promising celestial nectar to come in a few months. His other hand reached her swollen belly and lingered there, caressing the soft silk pajamas above her miraculous womb and sending warmth and vibrations to their little angel.

"How hell is it possible to incarnate all female divinities in only one body and one soul?" Mulder whispered at last in her ear with a reverential tone.

Scully sighed and smiled, but replied nothing, knowing perfectly that there would be more -more worship, more adoration, more sweet words, caresses or looks-, just quietly keeping doing her profane task.

Mulder finally moved away and busied himself, picking up and gathering cooking utensils and vegetables in the kitchen. He put the whole on the table opposite to Scully, stood face to her and began to cook. He was willing to offer her a sumptuous meal -his own pagan oblation-, being the leader of a Sunday Scully's worship service she was the only one to witness. While peeling and chopping greens he was keeping an eye on her, observing her moves and admiring her dexterity. What was the most thrilling, what was mesmerizing his sight, sending him sparkles of proud and love in his heart, was the unbelievable picture of a Madonna handling guns.

Lost in his vision of Dana Athena, goddess of wisdom and war, images were resurfacing in his mind. They were overlapping the quiet and innocent scene playing out in front of him, old slides from his photographic memory projected over the real and animated Scully. First, she was a pony-tailed baby agent challenging his trust, facing him and fiercely pointing a gun that she would never put down first. Then, she switched in an even more determined badass G-woman, shooting him in the shoulder without blinking an eye. This day, surrounded and blurred by darkness and hallucinogens, he hadn't just been pierced by a bullet, there were arrows of love and care penetrating his skin and settling down in his heart forever. Then, she was morphing into the Devil Donnie killer, the Fury one, the goddess of vengeance he was afraid to encounter once more, the one she could became in a blink if some evil force would be bold enough to threaten him or their child. The crude and rough scene was playing again in front of him, the violence of her radical act punching his guts.

"Ouch!" Mulder screamed.

"Oh, Mulder... You have to stop scrutinizing me when you handle a sharp knife," Scully replied, in a tone she could use later on their daughter when she would mess around.

Mulder stood still, smiling shyly at Scully and waiting quietly. He didn't even watch his wound, didn't try to stop the bleeding. He was waiting for her to come, to take care of him in her M.D. shape, chasing the disturbing image of Scully as a murderer. He was waiting for his most efficient and natural painkiller, her touch and concern.

As she went close to him she grabbed a clean cloth, then checked quickly the injury and compressed the cut with one hand. Meanwhile, she took away the knife he was still holding. There was blood on the table, the knife and the vegetables. Raising her head, she dived into his eyes, seeing there all his vulnerability and sweetness. However, maybe smelling blood or thinking of the blade he had fumbled with, she remembered how decisive and purposeful his look had been when he had slit the throat of the man who was strangling her to death. Of course he could be a wild killer if he had to. And that was sexy as hell.


	12. L as Love Show

**L as Love Show**

"No, really, Scully, come on and watch it. You'll love it," Mulder shouted to Scully from his desk, where he was staring intensively at his laptop.

These last months, Scully was hearing too many "Hey, Scully, look at that. I love it!", or "I love these guys, they are amazing", "I loooove the gal who writes that", and so on, and so on... Mulder had found cryptic websites or obscure YouTubers speaking about nerd topics that Scully wouldn't even want to know by herself. If any of these subjects could really become interesting -for both of them- Mulder would let her know in a far more serious and persuasive way. He would explain her what seemed important, would synthesize information, would show her the main photos and videos. And, whatever the matter, he would intrigue her and she would be enthralled.

She could say he was good at that. He had years and years of practice, since their first meeting when he had made a slide show in the basement, just for her. Combining words, facts and images. Having a passionate tone, making his own persuasive gestures, sharing his enthusiasm. He was her showman. Her one-man show actor able to dive her into his spooky discoveries and theories.

"I'm not sure I'd want to see and love that right now, Mulder," Scully replied, sitting and relaxing on the couch, eyes closed. "Besides, I have a pain in my neck, moving up and down. I don't want to watch a little bright screen and..."

"It's okay, Scully", Mulder whispered close to her, having given up his research as soon as he had felt her discomfort. "Let's cuddle and let me massage you."

She let herself fall in his arms, his hands and fingers, his warmth and gentleness. He kept on whispering kind and sugar words, sliding smoothly in her veins and nerves like a magic secret balm.

As she sinked into a heavenly state of dreaminess, a reverie took place in her thoughts, her Mulder's Love Show.

She's her own producer, she's the only public. The stage is her mind, the showman is Mulder through the years. There are several parts in the Love Show, and it's never exactly the same performance, but there are some universal constants.

Today, he begins with a stand-up -not comedy, but poetic romance- holding a mic in his right hand. With his amorous warm voice that deepens as he's aging on scene, he throws towards her lines and lines of declarations of love, without even pronouncing it. 'Love' is forbidden in this play -a word restricted for the things or nerd guys he loves in their daily lives- and the mere cliché 'I love you' is far too common and meaningless for them. He carefully chooses -has always chosen- his words to make her reach the sky and the stars, to make her sense how transcendental and otherworldly is their relationship. She's his one in billions -she has to update the figure- her touchstone, her homey, she's never just anything to him. She could never be bored to listen to the same words again and again, could never be satiated to feed her heart with them, would always wait for the next ones. He gets rid of the mic and makes a sign towards her with his hand. She has to come closer to the stage, because now he's the mature Mulder, the one who has to speak low, to whisper to her, as if they were surrounded by people or located in a sacred temple. Here comes the worshipping, the prayer for an eternal bond, the promise to stand by her side and listen to her forever, to keep believing in them and their harmonious reason and faith, to relight her candle and extend her prayers through his.

He then remains silent and begins his true close-up magic, face-shifting constantly from a young Fox to an aged one, in no order or logic. There comes his moving facial gestures that has made her long for so many years and continue to magnetize her. His intense gaze that sends burning arrows in her heart since they have met. His lovely smile, shy and head bent down as a young agent, wider, straighter and with deeper eyes wrinkles as years pass. Finally, his jaw clenching that turns her on immediately because she sees there all his vulnerability and sensibility.

Now, as he had made her -his only public- climb up on stage, she becomes her partner in his act, her assistant who must be persuaded that she deserves to be in the spotlight. A strand of hair tossed behind her ear, a gentle caress on her chin, a forehead slowly bending down her own, a thumb lingering on her lips. Hands squeezing her shoulders then joining hers, and their fingers intertwined. Suddenly, a hand on her lower back -on the spot that had been specially shaped for nestling his comforting hand- and he leads her into a slow dance.

As they are spinning together, their bodies so close and seemingly so young, the decor is changing. There's a bed, a soft light brought by candles, warmth in the air. They are in their bedroom, their sanctuary in their unremarkable house. They softly fall onto the bed, and they are laughing, their bodies entangled. But soon he becomes serious and hesitant. Without a word he asks her if he can, if she let her cross the line. He has the face and body of their happiest days, when they have shared absolute bliss before his abduction. She's always ready to reenact their first times, this unique amazing peak of passion that she's grateful to have experienced in her lifetime. This is Mulder's Love Show, so he leads and directs the foreplay, even if it's not the truth of what had happened decades ago. Anyway, the script is never carved in stone, and the show has to ultimately end with minds and bodies in their fifties, acting their renewed and actual passionate lovemaking.

"Are you feeling better?" Mulder asked with his soft low voice.

Scully almost jolted as she was suddenly withdrawn from her reverie.

"Yes, thank you," Scully replied.

Then she stood up, took Mulder's hand and said:

"Come with me upstairs. I was attending a show and I don't want to miss the end."


	13. M as Moaning

**M as Moaning**

Mulder and Scully were shopping in the groceries store they are now used to frequent, close to their unremarkable house. That was just a mundane task they were sharing in their most casual clothes, as other ordinary old couples would do. They weren't as standard as the other ones wandering in the aisles but that was hard to notice. How could you tell they had spent half of their life chasing monsters as FBI Agents? That they were bound together by a relationship you would have a lack of words to describe? That they had both to perpetually bear a considerable weight of loss and sufferings in their heart and soul? Even if you were tracking them on CCTV, you couldn't tell. Surely, if you were a customer suddenly attracted by these two people and compelled to spy them for a while, you would have noticed the way they move and behave together, the tiny but ardent gestures or looks they share, the cryptic words they exchange, all both so banal nevertheless so intense and particular. Doing so you could define them as a more-than-twenty-five-years married or so couple, a woman and a man in their fifties that have spent a lifetime together, and you would envy all the mysteries and secrets of their exclusive relation that you could never suspect.

Scully was waiting beside the breakfast cereals shelf, quite bothered by their current mundane task -going shopping. She looked up at Mulder, standing a few meters further, staring at items he was holding in each hands. He had put on his black horn-rimmed glasses, trying to decipher the small writings on the labels. He then raised his head and stared back at her, a playful smile taking shape slowly and his eyes suddenly locking to hers, sending sparks of adoration through the air.

"Mmm...", Scully moaned out loud, completely aroused by her vision -a very explicit erotic moaning.

Immediately, the few people surrounding her turned around in unison and looked at her face with shocked expressions, trying to figure out what just happened -or rather whether what they thought had happened had really happened. Scully flushed and rushed towards Mulder, seeking shelter and oblivion, coming back in their bubble of intimacy where all the world around would vanished. Mulder took her in his arms, kissed her lips quickly nevertheless passionately, then whispered in her right ear:

"Oh, babe, you turned me on. Can you just hold back a few minutes more? Time to pay and go the car?"

Scully agreed and they finished their shopping faster than planned, avoiding and ignoring a few angry or envious looks aimed at them by strangers.

While retreating in the safety of their car, Scully was remembering how all this had started. Moaning so often, louder than ever. Moaning without restriction in public places just by staring at Mulder, or even looking at photos of his face in her phone. She remembered that late night in St Rachel Motel -or early morning after Chucky and Judy deaths-when Mulder had waited her behind the door, so damn looking hot. She had never been a huge noisy woman -especially before any real foreplay had begun- but this moment had changed her forever. She had moaned just as she had opened the door, unable to keep inside all the fire that had instantly sparked in her belly. She had then moaned all along their shared moves, touches, kisses, interlacings and flesh blends. She had moaned so relentelessly and screamed so loudly when she had reached her climax that all the other clients must have heard her.

These moans were the symbols of their new second chance together, of the bliss they were in since that day, of the felicity of their renewed mature love. She would never want to spoil that happiness and inner freedom, and she preferred to be ashamed of her public moaning than suppress and suffocate them. She had lost enough time in her life to bother about that sort of things. Now, her priority is to enjoy being with and loving Mulder, no matter what are the consequences.


	14. N as Night

**N as Night**

"Voici mon secret. Il est très simple : on ne voit bien qu'avec le coeur. L'essentiel est invisible pour les yeux."/"And now here is my secret, a very simple secret: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."

Le Petit Prince/The Little Prince, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

_Notes: Some inspiration and all the quotes in italic are coming from the novella "Le Petit Prince" by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (English translation)._

* * *

The female red fox stepped out of the woods and trotted towards the unremarkable house she was used to frequent on her nocturnal wanderings. It was a safe and suitable place in her territory to find some tiny preys and various food. Every now and then, she could observe movements inside or outside the house and she would satisfy her curiosity about the humans living here, sticking around far longer than necessary. Sometimes, if she was lucky enough, she could watch the tall man sitting on the porch or standing in the yard eyes raised upon the sky. She would then spend time circling slowly around him, or staying quietly on the grass a few meters away, feeling attracted by this non-threatening being, his odor and his hypnotic low voice. Was the human aware of her presence? She wasn't sure, but if so, she felt no danger. Tonight, the weather was cold and quiet, a three-quarter moon in a cloudless sky bringing a bright light on the landscape -surely too much luminosity to remain unseen and discreet for the whole wildlife but the gracile red fox wouldn't mind moving into the open yard.

In the shared bed upstairs the unremarkable house, Mulder abruptly waked up from his recurrent nightmare. As usual he had been in that damn alien spaceship -or whatever hellish place it had been- reliving too vividly the horrendous torture he had been through so many years ago. He knew that he would never ever come in peace with this part of his life, that the traumatic event would haunt him till his death. Though, time passing, he had somehow subdued and controlled the induced fears and traumas, lessening the toughest effects of the nocturnal nightmare on his body and mind. Tonight was one of these relatively preserved nights. He had been extracted from his bad dream suddenly but rather softly, knowing in a second where he was -in the safest place he could be, beside his beloved Scully- and not being completely soaked by sweat. Hopefully, he hadn't awaken her -she was still sleeping deeply- so, in an instant, any remaining trace of angst vanished.

Anticipating the one to two hours of insomnia he would have to go through, he took time to appreciate Scully's presence by his side. He noticed that she was lying askew in the bed and was hugely invading his personal space -actually, they weren't even located in their usual sides of the bed. They both had quickly fallen asleep while snuggling in their intimate postcoital cuddle and their positions hadn't really changed since, they were just more disentangled. Mulder was highly tempted to touch Scully, to slide his hand along her warm naked body then to linger on her miraculous swollen belly, but that would be unwise -she deserved the most peaceful sleep in the world. Instead he inhaled and sniffed her scent on every accessible part of flesh and hair, even on the pillows, the sheets and his hands. Among the mixed smells he was trying to discern Scully's different fragrances, to specify them -the long-lasting ones that would bring memories of their first close encounters in the basement or in his apartment, the recent ones that would recall him how blessed he was to have her once again by his side.

Now completely awaken and fulfilled by comforting and warm feelings he left the bed, grabbed clothes, dressed in the corridor and walked down the stairs. He poured water in a glass at the sink, and while drinking it beside the window he noticed the quiet weather and the cloudless sky. That was perfect to carry out some night rituals. He put on his warm coat and boots and got out. Once outside he slowly moved forward on the porch, allowing time for his eyes to familiarize with the semi-darkness, all ears and attentive to the surroundings. He finally walked down the yard, and raised his head to the stars and the moon.

"I can sense you are here, my little alter ego," Mulder said with a soft voice. "That's good to see you once again. Seems that we have always the same schedule."

He spent time to contemplate the sky, to let the starlight and the weight of the universe unleash his deepest emotions and thoughts, the ones that could only been revealed in such circumstances.

"I already told you, I'll be a father. It's huge and overwhelming, as much as the universe upon me. Time to redefine priorities and responsibilities."

He paused a few minutes.

" '_All men have stars but they are not the same things for different people_.' Mine are Samantha. My sister has settled in any one of them and she is happy there, laughing loudly as she was used to do when we rode our bikes to the beach. '_At night I love to listen to the stars. It is like five hundred million little bells_.' And if I'm lucky enough I can also witness falling stars. It's when Samantha remembers that's I'm here on Earth, waving at me and calling out my name... Fox."

He smiled and turned his head, looking in the direction of the red fox he could only vaguely discern.

"Fox. Can you imagine what it takes to be called by this name?"

He then gazed at the moon, its three-quarter face facing him and keeping an eye on the planet below.

"Here stands my mother. She looks after me but her care and attention periodically fluctuates. She sometimes even hides herself in the daylight, still having guilt and shame, not being able to completely and permanently face me and her past. But it's okay, I understand her feelings. Right now she's quite bright and radiant."

Though, not wanting to dig too much in his feelings about his mother, Mulder turned around and scanned the part of sky opposite to the moon, searching for satellites.

"There," Mulder said after a few minutes, pointing a moving tiny light. "There are the Lone Gunmen. Always together, packed like sardines in this highly technological van, spying and hacking, checking the whole planet and seeking conspiracies."

Mulder lowered his head and faced the animal.

"And my father? I must find him a place somewhere if I want to be one myself. It's hard and still unresolved. My feelings about him remain too wild and still troubled... For lack of a better, I could pretend that you would be him, whatever your gender, for how long you would want to encounter me. I sense that you are attracted to me, as I am to you, and yet we would have to tame each other. And when you are gone, I will still remember you, sticking around the house. What do you think of that, little wild fox?"

The red mammal was half hidden by a bush down the porch since the human had stepped out in the grass, searching lazily for odors and -unsuccessfully- for tiny food. She had raised her head on these last human words, sniffing the air and trying to figure out why she was compelled to get closer to this being each time she was visiting the yard. The man turned back and softly climbed the stairs to the porch. Before entering the house, speaking more loudly in her direction in a authoritative tone, he said: "Don't leave! I'm coming back quickly!" After a few seconds of indecision, she walked forward to the place he was standing moments ago, lingering there, once more not able to leave, too intoxicated by the intricate smells hovering above her.

* * *

As soon as she heard the door creaking the red fox groveled instantly on the grass and remained still, hoping not to be seen by the human coming back, yet not at all afraid. Her instinct should have made her flee away or take shelter into the bushes or under the porch, but, once again, she behaved incautiously as if she was under a magic spell.

Mulder came back arms filled with his laptop and smartphone, a warm blanket and a sunflower seeds bag. He delicately dropped all his stuff on the relaxing chair, picked up the seeds and quietly moved to the top of the steps. He looked for the fox but couldn't see her, flattened as she was in the grass.

"I don't know if you are still here, but I believe so. Let me give you some seeds. It might not be a delicacy for you, yet it's something that links me to my father... the one who raised me," Mulder said out loud while spreading handfuls of seeds in the grass surrounding the foot of the porch stairs.

Then he settled into the armchair, making himself comfortable for the hour he would spend outside.

"Well, should I pretend you listen to me? If not... I'm just talking to myself out loud, is that a problem? As long as Scully doesn't know..."

He opened his laptop, picked and chewed some sunflower seeds. Waiting for the computer to start, he resumed his monologue.

"I have to make precise plans and projects for the future, when the baby is born. I want to stay at home for a while, be a full-time father before school arrives. Scully would soon need to socialize, to go to work, to save lives at the hospital or wherever. You know, I have to convince her that I won't go astray or meet again the big black dog..."

At these words, the little red fox stood up. She had sniffed the sunflower seeds and, as she hadn't eaten enough since the night had fallen, found the odor very attractive -even intrinsically associated to the tall man. Keeping her eyes and nose on him -he seemed less threatening from where he was now standing- she walked forward to the bottom of the steps.

"Go on, treat yourself my friend, those are harmless seeds," Mulder said with a huge smile.

"Those are not '_seeds of the baobab_'... I had done my duty for so many years, I had suffered so much and made my beloved ones suffer even more. I'm tired of watching out for all the threatenings, all the darkness seeds growing up on our damn doomed Earth. True that '_a baobab is something you will never, never be able to get rid of if you attend to it too late. It spreads over the entire planet_.' But for now, for a while, Scully and I deserve some peace..."

Mulder glanced at the fox, its head leaned over the sunflower seeds. The vision warmed his heart and gave him hope. Hope that he and Scully would be indeed in a happier path, hope that he would make peace and sense about his paternal linkages and feelings.

"Scully once said to me to write the darkness down, to put it in a book. It's what I will do. It's what I have begun to do these last nights. That would convince her that I'm serious about my plans. And there's more I want to do. Write stories for our kid, maybe for all the kids. '_I do not much like to take the tone of a moralist. But the danger of the baobabs is so little understood. Children, watch out for the baobabs!_' That also sounds like a respectable purpose, isn't it?"

The fox was tasting the sunflower seeds, cracking and chewing them in her mouth, making too much noise. At first, she didn't notice that the human had moved unusually and swapped his laptop for his smartphone. Soon, she sensed the man's agitation even if he hadn't left his position on the porch. She raised her head in his direction and a bright flash hit her eyes. This time, she fled in a blink.

"Oh, shit!" she heard while running towards the woods.

* * *

When Mulder came back afterwards to the bedroom, he discovered that Scully was now lying straight on her side of the bed, still deeply sleeping. He undressed and settled under the sheets, delighted to feel remnants of Scully's presence on his side -her warmth, smells and some slight cavities on the mattress and the pillow. He fell asleep instantly.

* * *

Hours later, when the night was about to give way to the dawn, Scully waked up, needing to go to the toilet. The room was filled by Mulder's audible breathes, a sign he was profoundly sleeping. She wanted to linger a while, to get closer to his body, but she had imperatives to satisfy. She left the bed, put on her robe and went to the upstairs bathroom. Then she walked down to the kitchen and poured orange juice in a glass. Stepping towards the couch, she noticed all Mulder's stuff that had been laid on it hours ago. She knew that he was regularly up in the middle of the night, going through insomnia by working on something. Something he would explain to her later, when he's ready. She noticed that her smartphone had been moved, prominently displayed on the coffee table. A green light was blinking on it.

"Mulder...," Scully muttered.

She checked her phone and, indeed, she had received a message from him. Actually, two. On the first there was a photo, full of darkness, with a kind of blurry shape in its center. She read : "My new friend, a red fox I have tamed with sunflower seeds." She smiled, thinking of Mulder and his love for blurry photos of monsters. The second one was lightened -he must have used the flash for that one- but she could only see a movement, red colored. She read : "I screwed up using the flash."

Remembering Mulder and his supposedly pictures of a were-monster, she grabbed the two notebooks and a pen she kept nearby. Months ago, when she had known she was pregnant, she had decided to write down memories for her future child. One notebook related to her childhood and her family, one other focusing on her relationship with Mulder. She would note every anecdotes, facts, remembrances, whenever they came to mind. She felt compelled to leave traces, clues that would explain her -their- convoluted lifetime story. She had as well hope that her son William would read these words -she could sense that this was bound to happen, one day. That was also a way to ground herself for good in the unremarkable house and in their renewed couple. Soon they will form a true family, an almost common one -as they have so much desired it- and they will have to redefine their lives, their priorities, their responsibilities. Finishing to write the were-monster pic story, she thought about a day in her childhood, when she was out in the woods with Bill and Charlie and they had probably seen a big threatening animal. She wrote it down into the other notebook.

She didn't spent a long time downstairs and she was soon eager to get back to bed. She knew she would be able to quickly sleep again till late in the morning -this was the week-end- apparently an advantage of her pregnancy. When she laid down and closed her eyes, Mulder began to snore.

"No, no... That can't be," Scully whispered.

But she was a woman of science and she had already made experiments. She slid her right thumb along Mulder's jaw line, appreciating the sound the stubble made under her nail, and reached his mouth. She rubbed his lower lips several times, then, as Mulder sightly opened his mouth, she leaned in and kissed him. Mulder exhaled a long breath coupled with a low moan and changed his position. His breathes became inaudible and Scully fell asleep.

* * *

Both the sunlight reaching them through the window and the songs of the birds on the roof made them give up their morning dreams. They both wake up late, almost at the same time.

Mulder was the first to completely emerge and, this time, he didn't prevent himself to touch Scully.

"Morning," Scully replied to his caresses.

"Morning, my beautiful rose."

"Oh? I'm a rose today?"

"Well, that suits you, isn't it? You have thorns to protect yourself '_against all the world'_."

"Is it because you have read _The Little Prince_?" Scully said, pointing the book on Mulder's nightstand.

"You can say that. You know, this book is very inspiring."

"You have encountered the Little Prince's fox this night?"

"So, you have seen my messages... I hope I didn't screw up the whole taming process. I have frightened the poor animal with the flash I didn't want to activate."

"I'm sure the fox will come again."

"If you say so... '_You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed_.'"

"'_You are responsible for your rose_.'"

"Oh, Scully, you know how to turn me on."

Mulder get closer to Scully and took her whole body in his arms.

"'_It is the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important_.' Now, I don't want to waste any time," Mulder whispered into Scully's ears while sliding his hands on her naked body.

"Neither do I," Scully replied, giving him back all his caresses.

"Do you love me, Scully, after all our misguided paths?"

"'_Of course I love you. It is my fault that you have not known it all the while._'"


	15. O as Outlaws

**O as Outlaws**

* * *

_Arlington Public Library _

Mulder and Scully were enjoying visiting the Arlington Public Library. For themselves -both were readers and had always found pleasure to wander in a library- and for expectations of the years to come -they had planned to bring their unborn child as soon as possible, and they even already liked to pick up and browse child books. They could now afford to spend more time in the building, Scully having slow down at work and Mulder essentially busying himself at home on his own schedule. They had no precise routines in the library, however they often split when arriving, each one following their own desire, requirement for work or just happenstance, then reunited in a random aisle and finally finished to linger together in the building for a while.

This day Mulder was the first to end his own path and had begun looking for Scully. He was heading for the children area via an obscure aisle filled by nonsense esoteric books when he saw Scully acting strangely right there in the spooky zone. He hurried to reach her and grabbed her right hand that was committing an offense.

"Scully? What are you doing? You, stealing a book?" Mulder whispered.

Scully immediately flushed and wasn't able to pronounce a word for almost one minute. Mulder didn't push her to give an explanation as he had quickly sensed how overwhelmed she was.

"It's a... Moby Dick kid book..." Scully managed to tell. "I... I couldn't help... all the memories coming back... I felt compelled to..."

"Okay then. Put the other books you didn't hide there. Hurry up!" Mulder said while dropping his own books on an empty place of the closest shelf.

Then he pulled her arm and dragged her toward the exit in a hurry.

"Mulder!" Scully shouted as she heard the dull noise of the volumes falling down to the floor -she hadn't had time to properly put her books beside Mulder's ones.

They didn't stop their purposeful quick strides until they reached their car in the parking lot. There, breathing faster than usual, they laughed like the two children they used to be so many decades ago.

"It's okay, Scully?" Mulder asked, suddenly recalling Scully's pregnancy. She was always in a so good shape that he could easily forget her condition.

"I'm fine, Mulder. Let's go back home before being caught as outlaws we have become."

* * *

_Unremarkable House - Later in the evening_

They were half-lying on the bed, encircled by pillows, Scully's body comfortably snuggled against Mulder's one, their faces, arms and chests lit by the flickering warm gleam brought by few candles put on their nightstands. Mulder, eyeglasses resting on his nose, was reading out loud for the fifth time the book they had illegally borrowed at the library, acting with his voice and gestures, showing and commenting the beautiful pictures to Scully, as if she was a child listening to her bedtime story.

"Enough?" Mulder asked when he finally closed the book.

"Yes, thank you. And promise me we would give it back tomorrow," Scully replied.

"Sure. We are still outsiders but no more outlaws... Though, I have highly enjoyed the thrill..."

Mulder put down his glasses and the book while Scully was blowing out the candles. Then, rearranging the pillows and the bed linen, they slid under the sheets and settled in their cuddle favorite position. They gradually fell asleep, wrapped in silence and a quietness they didn't break, both of them remembering bittersweet memories of their past when they were on the run and Mulder was a tangible and blatant outlaw.

* * *

_Somewhere on an unremarkable road, in an unremarkable county - So many years ago_

They had left the isolated log cabin in the woods for more than one hour and were driving now on an asphalt road, many luggage and belongings fulfilling the trunk and the back seats of their car. They had stayed and lived in this house for so many months -their true first home as a couple- the danger had been so far away from them for so long that they had accumulated too many stuff in their cosy nest. The whole hadn't been able to fit into the car.

As they were now obviously surrounded by civilization and were about to dive and settle into a quite normal life after being so long on the run -at least for Scully, Mulder still bound to keep a low profile for a while- Mulder felt Scully's emotion and the tears she was holding back. He reached for her hand and squeezed it, while maintaining his attention to the road.

"Are you okay, Scully?" he asked.

"I'm fine."

"Don't worry. Only mere happiness will come now. Soon we'll have the house you have ever dreamt of and you'll be a wonderful practicing MD in a pretty hospital. Well, I'm lying... maybe not the upper class house of a brain surgeon you'd deserve..."

"Thanks Mulder," Scully replied while smiling and squeezing back Mulder's hand.

A moment later she suddenly grabbed Mulder's right arm that was returned in its driving position.

"Mulder! Moby Dick! We didn't pack the book!" Scully shouted. "I've always wanted to bring it back..."

"Me too... We'll send money to the library. And Moby Dick will now have another life, surrounded by its companions, waiting for other readers..."

When they had settled in the cozy log cabin the sense of safety and comfort had came along and they had soon let go of Moby Dick and its associated evening ritual. They had stored the volume on a shelf that had been gradually filled by other books, Moby Dick becoming anonymous among them. All the books had been given up in the cabin.

"I guess I wanted to keep it as a souvenir," Scully whispered.

"We have our memories, Scully," Mulder softly replied. "You will always remember how it was, to be outlaws."

* * *

_Somewhere in a secret place - So many months earlier the so many years earlier_

At first Scully had been angry. They had taken too many risks this day, wandering in a not so small town, going shopping and then entering the public library. Too many people could have noticed them but Mulder wouldn't buy that -their disguises were on point, they perfectly knew how to avoid CCTV. Moreover he had needed access, documentation and informations that the library could easily provide and they both lacked simple social activities, distraction and a connection with humanity and culture. So, they have spent the afternoon in the library. And then, when they had left the town, heading for a series of secret locations where they would hide for weeks, Mulder had displayed a stolen book from under his clothes.

"Call me Ishmael," Mulder said.

"Mulder, what have you done!" Scully had shouted back.

Later in the evening, it didn't matter anymore, Mulder had managed to convince her. The stolen book would become their spiritual evening companion, a mean to discuss about human nature, fate and hope, truths and beliefs, white whales and peg legs. They would settle the more comfortably they could in whatever bed or makeshift mattress they would have and they would read Moby Dick out loud together -very often by candlelight or feeble flashlights. They could have been able to buy the novel in a bookshop but the illegal status of their one was a reminder of their own fugitive condition. The ink of the rubber stamp on the paper and the labels on its cover would recall them the carefree hours they had spent in the library and would be a tangible bond to socialization.

One day the book would be returned to where he belongs and that would be the beginning of a new life. They would be free and no more outlaws.


	16. P as Parallels

**P as Parallels**

_Nowadays - In the unremarkable house_

"No, Mulder! Don't bring back parallel universes!"

"Wait, what? You're unfair, Scully..."

"Stop your bat crap craziness. It's just what I'm saying."

"Don't bat crap me neither, Scully. It's science. Hard science. Hypothetical but physics and mathematics."

"That's all you have to justify your nutty Sasquatch theory?"

"I'm just looking for new theories... I'm keeping an open mind. I'm drawing parallels and from that I..."

"...Drawing parallels? Mulder, have you ever imagine a universe where our paths are strictly parallel lines. Never reaching each other. Always apart."

"Too painful. I'd prefer the one where they are intersecting lines. We just cross our paths once, for a brief but intense sexy moment."

"And what about our universe? Is it worth it?"

"I don't want another universe, Scully. We had convoluted and chaotic trajectories since we collided into each other. There were some missteps and disconnections but we are now on the same smooth straight happy path."

"Have we ever followed parallel paths for a while? Being apart but moving into the same direction, at the same distance from each other?"

"I'm sure of that, Scully."

* * *

_Spring 2000 - In an alien ship/In Mulder's apartment_

_[Mulder]_

Once again awaken on this damn hell chair. For how long this time? For how many sufferings? Why these fucking aliens don't keep me on drugs until the end? Until my end...

Scully? Scully...

Maybe it's my blessing. To quit the numbness of the drugs. To quit this dreamless limbo. So I can be with you, Scully. You with me. In my mind and heart and senses. To feel you as if you were just a few inches or yards or miles from me. Out there. Not far. Looking for me.

Scullay! Scullay!

_[Scully] _

All I want is to disappear. Right now. For as long as needed. To melt into your shirt and your bed. Mulder...

To sleep and forgot my loss. To quit that damn harsh reality. To enter a dreamy limbo. So I can be with you, Mulder. You with me. In my mind and heart and senses.

If I close my eyes I can see you. I can reach you.

Mulder? Mulder!

_[Mulder]_

It's so cold, Scully. It's a freezing hell. It's unbearable, Scully...

I remember you in that alien pod. Naked. Frozen. How you almost died in my arms. When you rescue me, Scully, don't forget to bring me a snow parka.

Scullay!

I'm freezing but my heart is still warm. Burning with love. Our love. They can't take it. They can't test it. They can't shrink it. Scully, keep my heart warm and alive.

_[Scully] _

My heart is cold. My blood is freezing. Your absence is unbearable, Mulder...

I remember you on this operation table. Naked. Crucified. How you almost died on your cross. I will rescue you once again, Mulder. I will help you, I will get you up.

Mulder...

I'm shivering on your bed but my womb is warm. A flame is burning in it. A life is growing inside. Our baby. Our love child. Mulder, stay warm and alive.

_[Mulder]_

I can't move. These fucking aliens have crucified me on that chair. All I can do is open my eyes. To stare into the darkness. To contemplate my own damnation.

Scully, I'm a prisoner. I'm punished for my arrogance. For my faith in my quest. For the truths I have sought.

Scully...

A deadly damnation for not having stepped away when it was still time. Time to live another life. A normal life with you, Scully. A freer life for both of us. For our couple. Time to nurture our love in an endless world.

Scully? I was a fool and I am a culprit. Would you ever forgive me?

Scullay! Scullay!

_[Scully] _

I don't want to move. I don't want to get away from your bed. From your den. I close my eyes and I see you. Lying on that bed. Gazing at me. Contemplating my body.

Mulder, I'm unsettled. I'm both free and tied. I'm both condemned and rewarded. I carry the burden of your abduction and I carry your child.

Mulder...

I'm blessed with a miracle. Another life. A chance to live a normal life. A child to nurture with an endless love. I'm damned for my extreme expectations. For wanting a blissful life for both of us. For our couple.

Mulder? I am guilty. To have let you go back in Oregon and not stop you when it was still time. Time to make you step out of your quest. Will I ever forgive me?

Mulder... Oh, Mulder...

_[Mulder]_

Scully, the smell is awful. It stinks. I stink. There's the strong smell of dried blood. Of fresh blood and burned skin. And also... No, I don't want to identify the odors. It's so horrible.

Scully...

That chair is just stone. It's hard. It's sharp. It hurts. There's all the piercing metal. The nails, the wires, the screws, the... No... It's so abominable.

Scullay! Scullay!

_[Scully] _

Mulder, the smell on your shirt is a drug. To get high. To ease my pain. There's the faint smell of your dried sweat. Of the unique flavor of your skin. I want to deeply inhale every bits of your scent. It's so addictive.

Mulder...

Your pillow is just fabrics. But it's comfy. It's soft. It cures me. I can dive into its silkiness. It's so soothing.

Mulder...

_[Mulder]_

They won't be long to bring back their torture devices. To break the silence. To make me agonize and scream. I just want a moment of peace and reprieve.

_[Scully] _

I just want a moment of peace and quietness. Before coming back to the reality and resuming my search for you. Before crying and agonizing.

_[Mulder]_

I'm asking for still seconds. For a heavenly eternity contained in one heartbeat. Like the one I lived staring at you. Holding my own breath while you held Teresa's baby in Oregon. A vision expanding the possibilities of my whole future with you, in a heartbeat. My red-hair Madonna in a FBI black suit and a white blouse...

_[Scully] _

I want to pause time forever. To keep holding your striped shirt endlessly. The shirt that makes you a so gorgeous FBI's Agent. The one I love so much. The one you had on when you stared at me. Holding Teresa's baby in Oregon. When I saw in your eyes my whole world expanding into possibilities I'd never dare to expect before.

_[Mulder]_

I remember the two blissful days that had followed ...

_[Scully] _

...once we came back from Oregon.

_[Mulder]_

Two days off.

_[Scully] _

Just us. Together.

_[Mulder and Scully]_

We couldn't help ourselves. We couldn't stop touching each other. Exploring each other bodies. Murmuring sweet words in each other ears. Moaning with pleasure. Shouting our names in ecstasy.

Coming back to Oregon where all has started. Seven years of work being weighed by an accountant.

That was challenging our priorities.

We were insatiable. We were passionate. We didn't want to keep losing time. There was so much love to share. So much love to come.

I was still worried for you, for your faints and dizziness. But you kept saying you were fine.

If only I had known I was pregnant. If only I had deciphered the signs my body was sending to me.

On these two blissful days we had expanded our perspectives. We had envisioned our future. We had seen an endless world of love.

And fate has tricked us.


	17. Q as Quarantine

**Q as Quarantine**

* * *

They were sitting side by side on the leather couch watching lazily the evening TV news. These last days they had followed the vague and remote viral threat with a nonchalance that wasn't truly them. How could we judge them? They had encountered by the past so many hazards and dangers that they had become tired, or bored, or no more living on a constant edge -blunt knives that would and could sharpen at any critical moment.

Yet, tonight the threat was getting more palpable even if they were far away from the epicenter of the epidemic -the Covid-19 was fiercely spreading out its deadly tentacles in Europe, not having completely reached the whole North America, yet. And then, right now, for whatever logical or irrational reason, they felt in sync the same sensation, Mulder in his deeper guts, Scully in her deeper brain. They turned their face toward each other one, in sync, and all was said in seconds with a shared look.

Mulder sighed and took Scully's right hand in his left one.

"Well, that's it. The world is going to hell. No need of an alien virus," Mulder said.

One Scully's eyelid flickered, a so subtle movement that no one would have noticed but Mulder. He knew better.

"I guess I can cancel the surprised French trip I had planned for us in two months..." he said, appreciating the light raise of Scully's right eyebrow and the slight opening of her mouth.

"...An incredible hunt of the Beast of Gévaudan," he added before Scully could say a word.

Scully squeezed his hand.

"Let' organize and start our social distancing and quarantine," she said in a less serious tone she had first intended to, thanks to his nonsense lie.

"You know I can be the master of social distancing," he replied.

He instantly regretted his mere words as soon as they have spread out of his mouth -or should he say his witty reptilian brain prompt to manipulate words at light speed?- and instantly felt Scully's reaction -a tension in her fingers, a shadow in her eyes, appearing and disappearing both at light speed as well. He was staring at her and knew the way her thoughts were traveling through time right now, reaching a dark period of their relationship, ghostly years that were still haunting them. He knew that right now she was seeing him sweaty and messily beardy, not at all happy but as closed and alone as a clam deeply sinked into heavy layers of black sand, overpowered and subdued by his commitment to save the world but not himself and them.

No more words... He then brought her hand to his lips, put a kiss on a soft spot he knew so well and draw their intertwined hands to his heart, letting them there. That was his gesture to assure her he had grown up, he had evolved in so many ways that he wouldn't know where to start if he had to list them. He wouldn't let black dogs come around and encircle their unremarkable house, sniffing his scent and howling at night to call him back in their madness. He wouldn't dive into government or militaro-agro-big-pharma corporations conspiracies, in fake news spread out worldwide on the web, nor in ancient or new superstitions that will irremediably emerge alongside fear and ignorance. He knew better.

Nature, mutations and fate had blanketed humanity but that wasn't an X File. They both knew better. Still, that was something they could easily face and apprehend, intellectually, physically and emotionally -they had acquired so much experience during their basement assignation. That wasn't an extraterrestrial ploy, there were no paranormal forces piloting the disease, but there was an X File flavor in the air, an aura of unbelievable facts -even for Mulder- an insidious and invisible enemy to fight for a better future.

Scully's sad memories had soon flown away and she was now focused on the same silent thoughts as Mulder. Back in the days they had got their share of diseases, viruses, genetic mutations and quarantines. However they didn't endure them in the conditions they would now, in the coziness of their house and yard, in the warmth and quietness of their life together, in the safety nest of their deeper and stronger love than ever. She left his eyes she was staring at, and following the rhythm of each of his heartbeat drumming against her hand she moved her gaze along his face, along a path of details that defined him for her -nose, cheeks, lips, jaw, neck. Neck, back of the neck, and she traveled through decades to the Arctic, to her hand on his hot neck in a storeroom. Their first quarantine together among strangers, isolated by the icy weather roaring outside the tiny research station, deadly threatened by an ancient alien worm that could sneak into your deepest primitive brain, frightened by paranoia, fear and distrust creeping in each of them and then seeping into the stifling atmosphere.

She moved forward getting closer to reach his neck with her left hand and closed her eyes. She was remembering so vividly this moment, how their trust and faith in each other had been sealed forever by an exchange of neck offering and palpations, skin against skin. She had felt so alive back then in this closed room despite the presence of death drifting just behind the shield of the door. She smiled and opened her eyes, bringing back her gaze where it naturally belonged, on Mulder's eyes. There she saw him returning her smile and at the same time she sensed his free hand mimic her one, laying down on her neck. His thoughts had rejoined hers in the Icy Cape storeroom, remembering the sensations and thrills he had felt when Scully had applied her skilled M.D. touch on his sweaty skin. However, both of their remembrances were blurred by the decades that had flown away since then. Years of other restrained touches, of other sensual sealed moments of trust and bond, decades of body language and nonverbal communication, of rare meaningful words exchanged during critical milestones of their partnership. All these had melt and mixed, guiding now their bodies into cherished paths.

Mulder bent down his head and put his forehead against Scully's one. He then silently mouthed with his lips the words that always had the will to emerge in this position, even more in such a context -'when the world is falling apart, you are my constant, my touchstone'. She went along with him on the last ones -'my constant', 'my touchstone'- whispering and exhaling them in the air separating their mouths. The solemn words lingered there a few seconds -for they had that power- and when disappearing they took away some molecules, forming a vacuum in the space between their lips. They couldn't -they wouldn't- defy the laws of nature and physics, of chemistry and attraction, of magnetism and passion. In sync they joined their lips and they dived into primal emotions and sensations.

While sharing foreign cells of innocent bacteria, flavored molecules of saliva, sweet rubs, licks and touches tickling their nerves and traveling through their body to hit their brain, they were exchanging and conversing, reliving in this back and forth some steps of their relationship. They began with the highways of need and greed they had ridden long ago when they had allowed themselves to follow their sexual desire -they were blessed by the Gods to be able to reenact their first times- then wandered for awhile in the tortuous byways of loss, sadness, and grief -they couldn't obliterate the past that had forged them- and finished in the peaceful trails of exactness and obviousness where life has finally led them. Meanwhile their whole bodies had moved and when they broke their life-traveling kiss Scully was sitting across Mulder's lap, their hands having landed here and there under disheveled clothes or hair.

"Well..." Scully said, "we don't have to worry. You don't have to worry. We'll be safe and secure. We'll be fine. All the scientists, doctors and nurses on this doomed planet will handle the problem."

"And you? You'll be fine?" Mulder replied, a black shadow in his eyes and voice.

Scully bit her lips. She had pronounced cursed words -fine, doctors- and she knew instantly where Mulder's thoughts had gone. Her current work at the Quantico labs, her position of authority there, was not meant to put her in the front line of the epidemic, nor to avoid a quarantine at home. But... if they -whoever- needed her expertise and skills, if they called her as a doctor or a scientist, or even if she felt that she could help somehow, she would be available and prompt to leave the house in an instant. That was her, she couldn't deny this part of herself. No need to argue or discuss. There were no things she could do now to prevent that possible future.

She shrugged ostensibly her shoulders, bringing at least a slight smile on Mulder's lips.

"If things must happen, we'll think of something..." she finally said after a few seconds.

That was certainly sufficient for now, for that instant and for the present. That was the perfect sentence to hear for Mulder. He agreed its signification and its implication. Right now, she was her one in -how many now ?- billions with whom he wanted to be quarantined forever in their unremarkable house. Right now, she was her one on this whole damned planet with whom he would exchange microbes and fluids, the one with whom he would connect so intricately that he would touch every inch of her body with every cell of his own, so she would be contaminated by all his excretions and his frenzy movements, so they would reach together the heaven of concupiscence.

Right now on the soon quarantined leather couch.


	18. R as Rewind

**R as Rewind**

* * *

"But, Mulder, what are you doing?" Scully yelled from the kitchen when she saw him coming down the stairs, a bunch of cardboard boxes he had found in the attic in his arms. "Mulder, watch your step!"

"As we are confined in our house because of this damn virus, I want to rewatch with you some VHS we had seen together, back in the days. Hoping that the VCR is still willing to play," Mulder replied loudly in a overenthusiastic tone.

"I'm a little concerned that I might have broken it with my Mandela/Twilight Zone episode... You remember? Last time, the VCR spat out this dumb fake TZ Lost Martian VHS..." Mulder added after reaching the living-room. He dropped all the boxes on the coffee table with a heavy sigh.

Scully cautiously stepped towards him with a cup of tea in her right hand and a paper in her left.

"But... Mulder...", she said quietly as if Mulder were a child willing to realize a too big dream, "...Are you sure we would have time? and the desire? I mean... okay we are quarantined in the house, but... we have still work to do. _I_ have _a lot_ of work to do, even more than when I was working outside. I have these papers to write, and these reports to read... and I have..."

"Shh...," Mulder interrupted as Scully was showing him the paper she was holding. "I know, I know... You're busy. I barely see you even when I'm only a few inch away from you. We barely share stuff together these days. Always the nose on your laptop or your phone or your damn papers. You don't even see me anymore."

"No, that's not true... Yesterday, I...we..." Scully replied a bit guilty.

"Shh... No discussion. That's my magic cure to this whole weird situation we are in."

"Really? These old VHS? Do you know we can watch these movies online in a better quality at any time?" Scully asked, resuming her mother-to-a-child tone, and articulating each syllable of her last sentence.

Mulder sat down on the couch and looked at Scully, shaking his head.

"Scully, you know me better, don't you? A _magic cure_."

"Magic as in black magic, or as in a magic show?"

"As in charm and enchantment."

"In that old stuff?"

"First, you have to always respect the old stuff. Look at me!" Mulder said to Scully while opening his arms in an invitation to rejoin him on the couch.

Scully smiled back but stayed still, standing a few meters away from the couch. She glimpsed at her paper then heavily sighed.

"I really have to work... But, okay, I'm all ears. Why the magic in this old stuff?"

"There's a lot of magic in it. For instance, the _rewind_ _charm_."

"Oh no... I see where you want to go. Rewind our memories. Reliving the past. Mulder... That's not us, that's not you. We move _forward_."

"We can also use the amazing fast forward, of course. Still..."

Mulder made a pause and raised his right index, a sign meaning that Scully would have to take his words seriously.

"Right now, look around you. The world is crazy, spooky, we cannot even know what will be its immediate future. We hear all days frightening words. Covid. War. Death toll. Recession. The Great Depression. Every day our clown in chief makes his brainless stand-up. Do I continue the list?"

"No..."

"Sometimes I wonder if I'd prefer an alien invasion... I would have..."

"No! Don't even start with that!" Scully launched louder than intended.

Mulder raised his two hands and froze, having been caught by Scully and her authoritative FBI mode.

"I surrender. No aliens in this house, I got it. Let me go back to magic spells."

He rummaged in one of the boxes for a few seconds and picked up a VHS.

"Ta-da! Caddyshack!"

"Mulder, no."

"Scully, yes."

"But, you already know..."

"Oh yeah, you don't like it that much. But this old stuff is made of magnetic tape. Mag-ne-tism, Scully. And it was stored above us, and among a lot of other magnetic particles."

"And?" Scully replied, rolling her eyes.

"Who knows what surprises are recorded on it? How many magnetic forces had hit the tape and altered it forever? This VHS was just above our bedroom, Scully... Can you imagine the magnetic fields?" Mulder insinuated with a conspiratorial face.

"Are you turning completely bat crap nuts?"

Mulder shrugged in return.

"You don't even believe in what you are saying. I can see it in your eyes," Scully said with a big smile, amused now by all this silliness.

Mulder knew he was starting to bring her in his game. He resumed.

"We would be able to only play the scenes you like. There's a few, I know what they are. Or the scenes you missed because last time we watched it you were always gazing at me instead of the screen. Imagining all the things you wanted to do to my body."

"We finally reach the part about the so called 'rewind charm'?" Scully said, quoting the last words with her fingers.

"No... You have to wait for that. Waiting. That's part of the enchantment too. You have to be patient to reach the scenes you want to see. You have to wait and listen to the sound of the VCR spinning its little wheels. Meanwhile your own mind spins its brain wheels. And you are entering in a meditation state, kind of hypnotic with the hum, and you are more within the present time than ever..."

Scully replied nothing but quietly sipped her tea. Mulder rummaged once again in one of the boxes and picked up another VHS.

"The Exorcist! You like it!" he said triumphantly.

"Yes, but... I'm not sure I want to watch it currently. And this movie is frightening you. You are always finishing the watch you head hidden into my lap..."

"Yep. And you could play the tape forward or backward, choosing the most frightening scenes. And I would be stuck into your lap, my face against your thighs, dreading the scene that would come next, hearing the hum of the machine spinning its wheels during this suspenseful seconds, reproducing the loud regular sound with my lips against your center, and I would make you vibrate in unison, and I would hold on on your scent, on this specific scent that..."

"Wow, wow, wow!" Scully interrupted. "Here you are again."

Scully drunk her tea while looking at her paper. After a few sips she put down her cup on the coffee table. Meanwhile, Mulder was rummaging again in his boxes. He was losing Scully, losing his game. He had to be fast.

"And now, Planet of The Apes!"

"Because this film is foreseeing our very future, our world and civilization that is falling down right now? Or because there are scientists and doctors? Astronauts and spacecrafts?"

"Or bare flesh and a lot of hair? Okay... let's forget it."

Mulder threw the tape on the floor in the direction of the two other ones that had been subject to the same fate.

"Plan 9 From Outer Space?" Mulder quickly suggested.

"I'm done, Mulder. There's no magic in this movie. I'm going back to the kitchen and I'll work on this paper," Scully said waving her paper in front of Mulder's face.

And then she stepped toward the kitchen, turning her back to Mulder.

"Remember when this specific film made us go on vacation in Hollywood," Mulder said loudly. "Hollywood, Scully! How we discovered Hollywood and its decadence!"

"Bubble baths?"

"And more, Scully... and more... Remember when we came back for the premiere!"

"Mmm..." Scully mumbled without watching Mulder.

"Scully, pause!" Mulder suddenly shouted to Scully's back. "I have the remote control of the VCR in my hand."

"Meaning?" Scully replied, remaining still.

"It's my magic wand. The one that can allow me to do the _rewind charm_."

"Really?"

"Yep. Eject!"

"What?"

"Eject the paper!"

She opened her left hand and let the paper fly away.

"Rewind!"

Scully stepped back to the living room, walking backwards.

"Pause!"

Scully stopped.

"What?"

"You are going too fast. I have to put the slow motion. Slow-mo Rewind!"

"Would you let me play with your magic wand?" Scully asked, her hips sensually swaying while walking at a slow pace.

"Mmmm... You would be able to play with any of my magic wands."


	19. S as Sasquatching

**S as Sasquatching**

_A few weeks in May 2020 during the Covid-19 lockdown - Unremarkable house_

Scully was lost in the woods. It was dark, so dark and she didn't have any flashlight. Cold sweat was running along her spine. She was frightened. Something, someone, some being was somewhere, close to her, around her, circling her, chasing her. She had no gun.

She wanted to run as fast as possible but she couldn't. She wasn't able to control her legs. Her feet were stuck into the ground, so heavy that she had to consume all her energy just to make them raise for a few inches. She was condemned to move in slow motion if even able to move at all.

All of a sudden she was trapped, grabbed, seized by vigorous arms. A smell of earth, moist and moss invaded her nostrils. She felt long strands of something on her skin, thick fur or hairs, she was not sure. She had the sensation to be touched everywhere on her bare skin. Was she naked? How was it possible? Why couldn't she distinguish nothing? Just green and brown patches.

And then she heard soft whispers in her right ear. 'Scully... Honey...' She felt warm hands caressing her body, softly, gently. She opened her eyes -were they closed a few seconds ago?- and locked them into his. Mulder's eyes. Mulder, is that you? Were you chasing me? His only answer was the deep kiss he gave her.

Scully woke up in a jolt. Mulder was besides her, quiet and peaceful in his sleep.

'Damn!' she thought. Waking up just when she had started to feel aroused, just when the dream was becoming interesting and wasn't anymore a nightmare. A strange nightmare involving a spooky wild creature morphing into a hot Mulder...

* * *

First, a loud low beast-like roar coming from upstairs hit Scully's ears. She panicked for only a split second, her instincts as a G-woman and a mother having already produced a shot of adrenalin in her medulla. And then she heard them roaring with laughter, waves and stream of giggles wrapping her whole body, sending shots of joy and warmth in every cell of her brain. She took her phone and climbed up the stairs, moving upstream against the flow of high and low-pitched laughs that couldn't stop.

She found them rolling on pillows and blankets on the baby's bedroom floor. Mulder -his lopsided glasses having slipped on his nose- was still holding on his right hand the few papers he had printed out in the afternoon. Scully took a snapshot with her phone and stared at them, enjoying the vision and waiting for an explanation -if there was one Mulder would want to share. She didn't need to know all their little secrets.

"I've found a funny story on the net. You know... with the Covid lockdown, it's amazing how many things you easily find for the kids. So... there's this big wild animal in the story but I've changed it. I think I had a great success," Mulder told with a huge smile on his face. "In my story, it's Bigfoot."

* * *

Scully had overslept this Sunday morning so Mulder was long gone from their bed when she woke up. She craved to find him, to dive into his embrace before even starting the day -that was a luxury she could and would allow to herself during the quarantine. She found him in his office, seemingly very busy among piles of papers and his laptop. The door was broadly open but she stopped at the threshold -more than ever in these strange days she wanted to respect his territory- and knocked lightly on the wood.

"Hi, sleeping beauty. Don't be shy and come in!" Mulder shouted without even raising his head.

She stepped forward to reach his back and bent down, burying her face into his neck and encircling his upper body with her arms.

"Maps? Are you planning a trip?" Scully asked when she saw what were most of Mulder's papers.

"Are you aware of one of the consequence of the worldwide lockdown? We, humans, are making a pause. We almost stay still, quiet, confined in our nests. Less traffic, less noises..." Mulder explained to Scully.

"Peace on Earth? Somehow your altruistic wish had been realized? But with huge flaws because you hadn't been specific enough?" Scully teased Mulder.

"Mmm... Maybe there's a jinni at work here... But that's not my point."

"Let me guess... Aliens are worried not to hear us anymore so they would come back and check us?" Scully proposed.

"Cold."

"...or finally they have changed their mind about us screwing up planet Earth so they would come back and invade us?"

"Getting warmer... but leave the fucking aliens where the hell they are and stick to the earthlings."

"Wildlife? Animals? They are coming back in the places we have currently deserted and they are invading us?"

"Bingo! Haven't you seen on You Tube how ducks, deers, wild boars, even leopards are wandering on roads and streets in towns. The nature has begun reclaiming its space. "

"Why these maps? Our region and surroundings?" Scully asked, pointing them on the desk.

"I think it's a great opportunity to study a mysterious animal that could leave the deepest woods in our country and approach our civilization. There were witness reports in Prince William County not too far away from our house. In 1957 then in 2010. So I'm studying the geography of the area. I'm trying to figure out where these creatures could have been hiding and where they would coming out, and..."

"Are you telling me that you are actually doing some... indoor sasquatching?" Scully asked.

* * *

Scully was busily working for too many hours. She had still reports to write but weariness had suddenly overtook her mind and body. All the motivation she had when beginning had disappeared in a blink as if she had been tricked by a magician. Surely her subconscious had been triggered and awaken by what might happen in the back yard of the house. Still, she had to move from her position for her health's sake.

Stepping outside on the porch she was stunned by the warmth and the light. She had been stupid not to leave the house earlier, even for a few minutes. She walked around the house, looking for the two of them who seem to have disappeared in the most wooded area of the yard.

Moving quietly she saw movements behind a row of trees -essentially a hairy silhouette waving his limbs- and heard muffled roars and soft giggles. She stopped, picked up her phone from her back pocket and opened her recording video app. She zoomed in the scene occurring farther so she was now able to observe it on her screen without disturbing the two protagonists.

The baby was on the floor, lying down on blankets. Circling around with a lot of gestures was a creature who must be Mulder. What she could distinguish on the screen was just a green hairy humanoid -Mulder in his ugly Sasquatch suit.

* * *

Mulder ran back in long strides towards the unremarkable house, completely soaked by sweat, his bare legs and arms covered by mud spatters, his muscles sore by the great intensity he had put in his jogging today.

"It's me, I'm back!" Mulder shouted when entering the house. No answer, no noise, only quietness. He entered the laundry room and took his wet and dirty clothes off, all of them, throwing his filthy outfit on the floor. He would take care of it later after showering and finding Scully and the baby.

Climbing upstairs he slid his fingers in the beard he had let grow since the beginning of the quarantine. Scully had said nothing about it and he was wondering if he should shave it now or at least trim it into a more suitable and enjoyable shape for her. There was also the problem of his hair cut, having now long strands and curls on his head. How come Scully had said nothing about his hairs at all? That was an X File for sure.

"I'm here," Mulder said softly as he stepped into their bedroom. Nothing, once again. He should have looked into the baby's room. They must be there, asleep, but he was too dirty and beastly to dare approaching them right now.

As he entered the master bathroom a giant net -a sheet actually- fell upon him, enveloping his whole naked body.

"Wow! What's happening?" Mulder yelled as he was slowly collapsing on the floor, hands helping him to sit down gently against the wall. "Scully?"

She removed the sheet and knelt in front of him. She had a huge smile on her face and stared at him for a long moment. Mulder was looking back at her, happily surprised that she was herself without any clothes on her.

"What was that?" he asked softly.

"I'm fulfilling and resuming a premonitory dream I had a few weeks ago," Scully replied.

"I'm in your hot dreams? That was a hot one, isn't it?" Mulder asked with sparks in his eyes.

"Mmmm... it was a spooky one. Involving what might be a kind of Bigfoot," Scully replied while climbing on Mulder's lap.

"My feet are big?" Mulder asked, raising his right one behind Scully.

"I am squatchin' you, honey. Look at you right now, how wild and feral you are..." Scully whispered into his right ear.

"I'm not sure who is the most feral between the two of us. Right now," he murmured back. Then he licked her from her right ear to her lips and let his tongue lingering there while his hands were cupping her breasts.

Scully moved a bit her head away and bent it down in order to appreciate what she could see below. Then she stated in a husky voice:

"Mmmm... I'm so glad to have hunted and captured Big Bob."


	20. T as Tears

**T as Tears**

* * *

Mulder and Scully were busied in the far corner of their yard, fixing a part of the fence that had been broken and damaged by years and elements. The weather was hot and heavy -they could feel the high pressure of the atmosphere on their sweaty skins- and the sky was full of threatening clouds. These last days and weeks they were enjoying to perform shared tasks for which both of them weren't truly handy or skilled -still, Scully had a great advantage over Mulder from her medical and autopsy practice especially when it involved meticulous manual works. As for everything in their lives they could operate in perfect partnership without really planning the way they would proceed, they were just making it work as they went along.

"Hey, look at this one Scully," Mulder pointed out, showing her a stake that had a remarkably sharp point. "If only I had this one when I stabbed _Ronnie Has Risen from the Grave_! It would have been less a pain in the ass for me and a shorter pain in the heart for him."

As Mulder launched his quip the bright light disappeared, shadows wrapping them in seconds. Then, a few large drops of rain began to fall.

"Ronnie's tears?" Mulder asked, pointing up the sky.

"We have to stop and run to the house if we don't want to be soaked," Scully replied while gathering a few tools and dropping them in the box.

She was about to leave when Mulder grabbed her left hand.

"Stop and stay still," he said.

"But... Mulder?" she replied, launching a surprised look to him.

Mulder let go her hand with a huge smile. He tilted his head back and opened wide his arms and mouth welcoming on his face and his whole body the downpour now falling down from the sky.

"You think I'm crazy?" Mulder asked, still facing the elements.

Scully shrugged, mimicked Mulder's gesture and mumbled: "Anyway, we wouldn't have make it to the house..."

She then began to laugh.

"Unless we had lost nine minutes. Or rather gained nine minutes..." she said.

She lowered back her head to face him.

"Never understood how it worked," she added.

"Yet... Frozen and soaked by the deluge, in that gloomy cemetery by night... you had believed me," Mulder replied as he gave up his position and looked at her.

They locked eyes and both were instantly back in Bellefleur beside the graves. The rain had already drenched their hair, rivulets of droplets were running down their face, emphasizing the picture of themselves decades ago they had in mind. They were always amazed by the power of their remembrances. How they had the ability to retrospectively identify and relive these delineated past events, these particles of time and space appearing insignificant taken alone yet being the core and the forces that had directed the flow of their lives. Just as these tiny drops of water dripping their cheeks would become later streams and rivers.

"Let's go," Mulder said as he picked up the box and took Scully's hand.

"We have to always welcome the rain, Scully. As we welcome our tears," he added, leading her quietly toward their house.

"What are they today? These tears from the clouds?" Scully asked.

"They are highly claimed by the plants and the soil. It's completely dry, no rain for weeks. And they are also claimed by us, humans. To wash our anxieties. To let us express our emotions. Maybe these tears are sent by Mother Nature and Planet Earth as a comfort, or a warning. It's up to us to decipher the message."

* * *

When they entered the house they quickly moved toward the laundry room, dropping at each step splashes of water on the floor. Then Mulder fervently took care of Scully, helping her to remove her soaked clothes and drying her with a towel.

"Wow! Stop, Mulder. Strip off, you too," Scully ordered when she realized that Mulder hadn't given an equal attention to his own comfort.

"I don't want you to catch a cold because of me," he replied.

"I'll be fine," she added while helping him taking off his shirt.

"That's what you say. But don't _fine_ me. You know I don't like you using that word."

Scully smiled shyly at Mulder. She was aware of the scars she had let in his heart when it came to her physical or mental health. How with her _fines_ she had so often built a wall preventing him to get close to her inner anxieties, how that shield had never lessened his worries or guilt but had rather engraved them deeper in his soft flesh. After having hastily dried himself Mulder resumed his gestures towards Scully, delicately wiping her wet strands of hair. She let him do. Allowed him to express his tenderness and his care, these genuine and sincere qualities she had witnessed since their first case in Oregon.

"Hey, what's up?" Mulder asked. He slid his right thumb on Scully's left cheek, collecting a tiny drop on the tip of his finger. "Is that a single tear of you?"

She couldn't hide her wet eyes, dampen by emotion, so she shrugged, took his hand and kissed his palm. The single tear remained on his thumb. Like a bittersweet disease transmitted by a virus this droplet of salty liquid brought Mulder back in past dark places. An operating table where he almost died as a martyr, where his world was upside down, and where a miraculous single tear falling on his face had given him the will to get up and save himself. A hospital room where he almost died playing Russian roulette, where his mind was controlled by a self-called ronin, and where an enchanted single tear had given him the strength to fight the spell and pull the trigger on the right target. Dark places that had been lightened by one Scully's tear falling down her left cheek.

Mulder closed his eyes and inhaled deeply. When he raised his eyelids and stared back at Scully his eyes were moistened with tears. Tears beginning to leave his eyes and slide down his face.

"Are you okay?" Scully asked, a bit worried by his reaction and recalling that she hadn't seen him cry in her presence very often. Not that he would prevent himself to do so. She knew that he was prompt to weep without restraint if he needed it.

He nodded.

"These are tears of happiness, Scully. And I welcome them with all my heart."


	21. U as UST

**U as UST**

* * *

_U? UFO_

When Scully opened one of her eyes she just saw parts of sheets and pillows. She extended an arm, obtaining confirmation that there was nobody beside her. This is really so bad, she thought, as she was feeling a need, an urge in her body -surely a remnant of her last dream; she was vaguely remembering that it might have been a sensual one. She then heard soft sounds coming from the master bathroom, splashes of water and slight tip tappings.

Opening the door that had been closed to muffle the noise she found him in front of the sink, standing in his boxer briefs.

"Hi... Woke up early?" she asked.

Mulder glanced at her in the mirror. "Yeah... Did I just wake you? I was trying to be quiet."

"No, it's okay. Putting an end to your thick beard phase?"

"Yep. Thought it was about time. A gut feeling."

She stepped forward, reaching his back and its smooth hairless skin. She pressed her whole body against his, her face crushed between his shoulder blades, her arms around his waist, her hands rubbing his firm abs. She inhaled deeply his scent completing the sensation by licking and swallowing what might be residues of old sweat. She felt her already tingled body both weakening and stirring.

"Mmm... I'm glad I'm about to finish shaving. I'm a bit messy, hairs everywhere. Would you join me in the shower?" Mulder proposed.

As an answer she slid her right hand in his boxers. The mixed sensations under her grip of soft skin and rising firmness made her teeth bit his back.

"Ouch! We can skip the shower, if you're so hungry," Mulder managed to tell.

"I'm in for the shower. Warm water rushing down and sliding along your limbs and muscles. My hands soaping and smoothing inch by inch your complete body. And then..." Scully languidly added.

Mulder didn't let her finish. "...slow, soft and slippery moves suit me, as long as I'm keeping hardness where it's needed."

She detached herself from him with an ounce of regret, her body having already coalesced in his -warmth and heartbeats, desire and arousal mingled together regardless of the thin line of demarcation that were her pajamas. Mulder had already gotten rid of his razor and underwear when he turned around to face Scully and help her to strip off. They hurried to the shower but once there Scully slowed down the pace. Mulder let her take the lead despite his craving to be the conductor of her musical body and for a quicker release.

Struggling against Mulder's limbs and lips seemingly remaining out of control under Mulder's will, Scully had grabbed the biological bar soap she had recently bought and was frantically rubbing it -her new whim and the toy she wanted to use so fiercely on Mulder's whole skin to fulfill her fantasy.

"Honey... Let just me breathe a second. I need to make this stuff lather much more than that cheap foam..." Scully said, stepping back against the wall.

"What for? Why don't you use your energy on another bar to easily obtain a pure biological glossy substance..."

"Well... It's just a question of chemistry... You see, as it's biological..." Scully answered.

Alas, she had never been able to finish her scientific explanation or whatever she wanted to say. And she should have dealt with physics rather than chemistry, Newton's laws of motion and kinetic collisions rather than surfactant molecules. For a chain of action-reaction events occurred in one second, a Rube Goldberg machine IRL that Mulder would have highly appreciated and would have liked to reenact in front of Scully if it weren't for the state in which these forces had let him.

For in less than one second Mulder had been injured in the face by a soapy projectile willing to escape Scully's hands in a hurry, had fallen down harshly on his buttocks, had cried out in pain loudly and afterwards had cursed louder, so the baby had cried back even more loudly in a highly frightened tone, giving no choice to Scully to leave the shower and the bathroom to reach the baby's bedroom -yet not without having quickly checked that Mulder was and would be OK if left alone.

"Fucking Unpredictable Flying Object!" had heard Scully when running towards her baby.

* * *

_S? Skinner_

When Scully stared at Mulder sitting on the other side of the table she just saw quiet happiness. He was gently feeding their baby and doing so was wrapping all of them in smiles, sweet words, laughs, love. In the scene displayed in front of her nothing was out of the ordinary for an ordinary family. But could they be defined so? The three of them being alive, healthy and living an ordinary life right now was just a miracle, three miracles.

As if he had sensed her stare and thoughts Mulder turned his head towards her, his eyes launching back sparks of love and playfulness adorned with an ounce of sexiness. How could he do that? He was a marvel. Then he added a gesture, pointing at the slight mark the soap had made hours ago on his face just below his right eye. Scully's eyes and face began to apologize in return but he quickly dismissed it by a wink and a smile and soon his whole body fired a lust-loaded missile right into her heart and belly. He hadn't miss his targets and Scully's body blew up in a blink. She had to admit once again that wonders and miracles never cease with Mulder.

Later when they had finished their lunch and cleared the table she followed him upstairs instead of continuing her homework. The fire Mulder had ignited earlier was weaker nevertheless still burning and warming her. Busied with the baby he hadn't really followed up his sensual hints and hits but Scully had sustained the flames with a lot of fantasies in her mind. Mulder was now putting the baby to the bed for a nap making Scully conclude that it would be a perfect time to resume their morning aborted sport.

When Mulder stepped out of the baby's bedroom and closed the door she promptly took his hand and led him to their own room.

"Come in, I have to check your body. Checking possible sequelae," she whispered.

"Oh... I see... Wanna play doctor?"

Scully answered with a huge smile and took off her upper clothes.

Mulder instantly mimicked her gestures. "Mmmm... That's a very unprofessional way to take care of your patient, Doctor Scully."

Scully stared at his crotch. "There's only one way to be sure all is functioning well". And pointing to the bed, she added, "But we will proceed quietly, softly, gently, in a high secure environment that is this comfy bed."

"I'm your man!" Mulder agreed on Scully's lips.

He didn't lingered there and was already kneeling down, his mouth following a familiar southward path on Scully's skin.

Scully stopped him and made him stand up. "Wow, wow... You are my patient. I am the Doctor. I'm in charge."

She began to check his head, fluffing his hair and massaging his scalp. Then she kissed softly the bruise on his face while sliding down her hands along his back, her expert gestures examining at the same time the state of his muscles. Meanwhile Mulder had set in motion his hands, his left toying Scully's breasts and the right traveling southwards where he first intended to go. He became soon eager to use his lips and tongue, mostly unoccupied because of the way Scully was conducting her slow palpations, preventing him access to her face and other attractive zones.

When his fingers reached her warm wet folds his frustration exploded. "I thought you wanted to use a high secure comfy mattress. It's time to validate its putative qualities," he burst out.

And, in a quick skilled move, he picked up Scully and threw down their two bodies on the bed.

"See? I have no damage, Doctor Scully."

He didn't let Scully fight back and take over his control on her, restraining her movements with his arms and legs. Neither did he allow her to speak, just muting her by his dominating look.

"And you haven't enjoyed yet the new baby skin recovering my jaw and cheeks when it slides on your inner thighs. That's a shame," he quickly added in his most authoritative tone.

Alas, he had never been able to perform the symphony he had planned to conduct and play. He had had only time to tune the beautiful instrument he held in his arms -adjusting her position, pitching, pinching and titillating a few nerves- then to execute a gentle melodic prelude made of sighs, moans, and exhalations -slithering, licking, stroking her skin. For several noises had reached their ears, for phone calls and text messages had interrupted the beginning of the concert.

For all of a sudden their three phones had rung and vibrated in unison -even the landline one, a strong alarming sign- and if at first they had ignored them an immediate second wave of calls had irrevocably stopped them. Because it could only be emergency calls, probably coming from the FBI and requesting both of them. Within split seconds their minds and bodies switched in their Agents-in-alert mode, giving up pleasure and desire, redirecting the flow of blood and thoughts, and shifting thirsty gestures into practical ones.

"Fuck... An emergency... Skinner," Mulder stated to Scully out loud, even if he knew that she had already read the same message on her own phone.

* * *

_T? Teatime_

When at last Mulder had had enough time to stare intensively at Scully who was standing upright in the opposite corner of the large FBI room, he just saw her shining and outstanding among other agents surrounding her, despite her tiredness. He could guess and read on her profile that she had worked hard, had shared all her experience, all her expertise, all her intelligence to help the unit she had been assigned to.

He had done the same in his own group -they had been separated according to their own backgrounds, profiling and behavioral expertise for Mulder, scientific and medical evidences for Scully- and now he felt exhausted. The last hours had been frenetic without any pause. As soon as they had been called at home they had made arrangements for the baby in a hurry -they hopefully had a regular babysitter who was extremely available and dependable- and had hastily driven to the Bureau headquarters. There, Skinner had explained to them the situation -a delicate case of a missing Agent, a serious deathly threat- and the reason he had wanted them to join the rescue team -due to unpredictable circumstances they had a severe lack of available skilled and competent investigators. Mulder and Scully were happy to oblige, especially when it came from Skinner and knowing they had no more dissensions with the FBI -they were even esteemed by the young, an aura of mystery, myth and fascination being associated to their names.

As if she had felt Mulder's intense look, Scully stepped backwards, tactfully pulling away from her colleagues and detaching herself from their discussions. She then turned her whole body in order to completely face Mulder. They were way too far to start a conversation even by gestures and they couldn't yet leave their respective groups. Scully picked up her phone and showed it up to Mulder -they could and would text to each other.

She began the thread. 'Hi, handsome glasses wearer'

'Hi. Beware of the young tall lanky guy eating you with eyes'

'He's a funny guy. Witty'

'Even more dangerous'

'Too young. As if I didn't see how the tiny blonde is on you'

'Too skinny. Hasn't your body shape. Nor your eyes'

'Case. You. How?'

'Awful. Exhausted'

'Same here. Need to escape'

'Ready for a thought experiment?'

'Always'

'Remind our FBI secret closet?'

'Wanna go there? We can't'

'Only by thought, honey'

'OK'

'Imagine. We race to go there'

'Are we thirsty and hungry?'

'Of course. That's the point'

They raised their head up and stared at each other for a few seconds. And then they became oblivious of their surroundings, of the hustle and bustle in the room. They were in the corridors of the FBI, following the clandestine path they were used to take during the weeks before Mulder's abduction. When all was new and exciting, when they couldn't help to be thirsty and hungry all day long, when they would freely consume their love. Blissful days of happiness and recklessness. When their basement had turned into a too obvious and less exciting place they had found a tiny toilet utility room on the first floor, located in the furthest corner of the building and in an almost deserted zone. They would sneak out of their basement office and go there to indulge their needs and fantasies.

Scully resumed. 'Im in'

'Me too. I've the flashlight'

They were used to light the closet with only one flashlight, acting in quasi-darkness and remaining invisible from the outside. Somehow that had been a reenactment of their promiscuity and suggestive banter that had occurred in a toilet room at the Police Station in Home, Pennsylvania. The long standing curiosity had already been largely satisfied and Mulder's pen light was always taken out from his pants but there were still remnants of thrills, depravity, ambiguity and potential.

'Position?' Scully texted.

'Easiest. We are too old for prowess'

Scully laughed at this. She remembered some of their exploits in the narrow space, how foolish and flexible they were back then.

Mulder continued. 'Close your eyes. Relive the time we had been surprised'

'That had been the better one'

'Heavenly orgasmic'

They both closed their eyes and they were face to face, Scully's body lifted and supported by the edge of the sink, anchored by Mulder's arms and chest. They were scarcely undressed, they just have made enough room to allow their basic coupling. All had happened fast and they were already reaching the peak of their pleasure. That was when they had heard steps moving towards their secret room in the corridor. They had stopped the movements of their hips, had tried to control their heavy breathings, had frozen their whole steps were getting closer and they weren't sure that the door had been locked.

Alas, Mulder and Scully had never been able to achieve their shared thought experiment and relive the moment when their inner flesh had betrayed them in the narrow closet. For in the huge FBI room they had been frozen and stopped on the threshold of their rapturous remembrances, preventing them to feel again what had happened next in the secret room -how, despite their will, their inner muscles, nerves and mucous membranes had been still throbbing, vibrating, shivering, making them attain and outperform the most heavenly mutual orgasm.

For they had been withdrawn from their reveries by a loud shout at the present time.

"Let's make a fucking break for everybody," had told Skinner to a colleague next to him.

"Agents! Teatime!" he had then yelled powerfully for the entire room, making Mulder and Scully startle and jerk as if they had been caught red-handed -nevertheless probably avoiding them to exhibit moist and noisy embarrassments if it hadn't occurred.

* * *

_UST?_

"What a day..." Mulder said when he finally slipped between the sheets and rejoined Scully, late in the evening in their unremarkable house.

"A lot of tension," Scully replied.

"We need to decompress and release all the pressure we have still in us. Let's do some UST," Mulder proposed while adjusting their bodies into their favorite cuddling position.

"UST?"

"Usual Sexual Therapy," Mulder clarified while quietly and softly caressing Scully's body.

Alas, they didn't resolve their sexual tension this day. For in only a few minutes they had fallen completely asleep, exhausted as they were.


	22. V as Vertigo

**V as Vertigo**

"One doesn't often get a second chance. I want to stop being haunted. You're my second chance, Judy."

"And if you lose me, you'll know that I loved you and wanted to go on loving you."

Two lines from Vertigo, directed by Alfred Hitchcock

* * *

_Present time - Unremarkable House_

For once Mulder had overslept and woke up alone in their shared bed. But as consciousness was making his way through his mind he felt that things were odd. Pulling away the sheets, moving up and sitting on the edge of the mattress didn't discard his weird sensations. Uneasiness, dizziness, anxiety. He must have had a troubled sleep, bad dreams that he couldn't recall. He wasn't even sure what day, what year, what hour it was right now.

"Scully?" he called softly.

He raised up and stepped forward too hastily. His eyesight became blurry, his head and thoughts were spinning. Reaching the door he stopped there for a few seconds, leaning on the frame, trying to retrieve some balance.

"Scully, are you here?" he said louder, a break in his voice.

He resumed his movements, headed for the stairs. He walked down cautiously a few steps, gripping fiercely the handrail. Giddiness, vertigo, shakiness. That was not going better.

"Scully?" he only managed to whisper, eyes closed, jaw clenched.

After a few seconds he was able to reopen his eyes. To focus his sight on a silhouette downstairs. He could see the table. He could see someone's back and head seated there. From his elevated point of view there was something peculiar in that vision. A spiral. A hairy coil. A red bun.

"Scully, is that you?" he yelled, eyes and thoughts caught in a circular movement that couldn't stop.

And then all vanished. And then he entered into a limbo of gyrating memories and flashbacks.

* * *

He's sitting stably on his chair, eyes fixed on the video he's watching over and over. Yet, he's nauseous, giddy, unbalanced.

Because of her sugar words, wrapping him, sticking like cotton candy shaped by a centrifugal force. Because of her gestures, because of her eyes, moving around him, over and over. Willing to extract him from his depressive and recursive dark thoughts. From the circular black hole he endlessly dives into.

He's staring at the video, fascinated by the images filmed a few months ago. October 2012. A man alone in his capsule, in his pressure suit, overtopped by black space and stars. A man diving into the void, free falling toward the Earth. Just above Roswell. What an irony, he thinks. Roswell and aliens can go to hell, the world didn't end in December. And now all had gone to Hell for him.

He daydreams that he's Baumgartner the skydiver, able to make that hazardous step of faith. Escaping his dark obsessions. Evading his mental imprisonment. Able to jump. Able to come back and feel at home in their unremarkable house.

And then he steps forward and tumbles through emptiness. And then, he spins so fast that he passes out.

Leaning against the door frame in St Rachel motel, he's standing behind the closed door separating them. As the TV he had put on is wrapping him in insignificant background noises, he's waiting. His heart is drumming in his chest. His blood is cycling along his veins and arteries. His eyes are fixed on a random spot on the wood. It's just a matter of second. Her decision. Her desire.

When she opens the door as expected he stands steadily still. Nothing moves but his eyes, reaching for hers. His lips, barely forming a slight smile.

And then, all spins.

Scully firmly grips him. Resolutely encloses his whole body. Hastily seizes whatever she can, flesh, muscles, soul. Mulder is sucked into a vortex of sensations and emotions. His head is whirling.

And then their entwined bodies swirl towards the bed. Embodying a giant whirligig of passion. Vertigo and frenzy. He's finally, eventually, going back home for good.

He stands still, up the stairs. He can't move further. Otherwise he would loose his balance and fall down the steps. He's so dizzy, so desperate.

Scully stands at the foot of the staircase. Sad, desperate too. Her luggage encircling her. She's leaving. She can't stand staying here. She can't even climb up and reach him for her last farewell. If so, she wouldn't be able to leave.

They are both crying. Weeping ad nauseam. They are now out of words. Out of stableness. All had become so precarious and unsettled.

Suddenly she moves. To and fro, from the house to her car. In less than a minute she's gone for real. He can hear the car pulling away towards the road.

And then desperate thoughts invade his mind. A swirl of hopelessness. He could just step forward and tumble in the staircase. Would it be high and hard enough to make him go back home?

He's laying underneath the blankets, barely awaken, and he senses her. Standing still beside his pull-out sofa. He rolls on his side to face her. She can't sleep, the evil twins case is getting under her skin. 'Can you hold me?' she asks.

Of course. He wants to be her anchor forever. He wants to secure her, to ground her in his arms. He's waiting this moment for years. So they could stop to turn around each other over and over. So they could eventually inhabit a renewed home and shelter.

They talk to each other but their conversation circles and circles around them. Around simple words and feelings that would be solid roots to hang on. The words are spinning and they don't want to stabilize enough, to discipline themselves.

And then Scully thinks of something. She rolls on him and it's the beginning of something new. It's a starting point to stop wandering in the endless spiral of their relationship.

* * *

_Present time - Unremarkable House_

"Mulder? Mulder? Can you hear me?"

When Scully's words reached his ears he found out he was sitting on the staircase. He managed to open his eyes. His thoughts were still blurry.

"Scully, what happened?"

"You scared me like hell. You could have break your neck."

She was holding him with her arms and hands, securing him on the narrow step.

"Hopefully you had good reflexes and you just slowly fell down on you ass, still anchoring you at the handrail and the wall. You must have passed out for a few seconds," she added.

With one hand she checked once again his neck, his face, his back.

"But, what?" he asked.

"I guess you'll have to make a check-up. Maybe it's your blood pressure. Or a virus you caught, making you feel dizzy," she explained.

"Before passing out I saw a vision. Someone seated at the table, with a bun. A round shape of hair at the back of the head. It troubled me. And all went spiraling."

"It was me. I had lazily lifted my hair this way with a pen, for once. I'm sorry. I didn't hear you coming. I had earphones, listening to music while working on my laptop. I woke up early today."

"So, it's you? You here with me?"

"Mulder... What do you mean?"

Mulder's eyes then locked on hers. He fixed his sight there for a while and it was all it took to remember, to be comforted. He had had his second chance -their second chance- and he, they, had come back to their home. Together.

"No matter. I'm fine now. I'm just happy you are here, Scully."


	23. W as White

**W as White**

_Nowadays - Outside the Unremarkable House_

Scully was perched on a stepladder, concentrated on her task of the day, her right hand handling a brush while her left one was securing her. She was painting the wooden boards covering the facade of the porch.

"Hey, Rapunzel, how you doing?"

She jerked at the sound of the familiar voice, splashing drops of white paint in the air.

"Wow, wow! Sorry, didn't want to scare you!" Mulder yelled, worried that he could have made her fall. "Thought you heard me coming."

"I must have been bewitched by the white," Scully quietly answered while climbing down the steps.

Once on the grass, she turned around and faced him. He was displaying a shy smile in apology waiting for Scully to somehow punish his audacious and sudden appearance. Nothing of the sort was in her mind as she had been soon distracted by his mere appearance. His appealing look. She was approvingly contemplating his messy hair, his dirty and sweaty face and forearms, and above all his sexy tight white T-shirt that was completely stained by black and grey spots.

"How was your cleaning work in the attic?" she asked him in an amused yet seduced tone.

"Obviously dirty," he replied, pointing some stains on his shirt.

In return he stared at her, perceiving her own blots of white paint on her hands, her face and her multicolored outfit.

"Wanting to deny your rainbow-friendly side and disguise in Snow Queen?" Mulder bantered.

"See, the white color being a combination of all the colors, I'm just reinforcing my taste."

"Indeed. But keep on wearing outwardly many colors. I like to admire all of them on you, adding to the sky blue of your eyes, the bright copper of your hair, the light pink of your skin..."

Mulder stepped forward to reach her and kiss her passionately, while avoiding to spoil her with his dirt.

"...and the burning red of your wonderful lips. I even miss these tiny red spots of blood you had when doing autopsies," he concluded when breaking the kiss.

Seeing that Scully became suddenly thoughtful, Mulder felt quickly worried.

"Something wrong?" he asked.

"Not really. I was thinking... About what you said, how I choose colors. When I'm wearing white, or would want to..."

For a few seconds she remained quiet.

"Had you ever wanted to enter solemnly a church wearing a gorgeous white wedding gown?" Mulder launched carefully, unsure of how this conversation could end.

"Surely when I was very young," Scully replied in a casual tone.

"Do you regret I didn't offer you that?"

She ponders his question for a few seconds.

"No, not at all. Don't worry about it. Really," she firmly replied. Then she added, "And you, any regrets, not having witnessed me in the virginal white?"

"Never. I always wanted you in all the colors that makes you unchaste and complicated, that makes you who you deeply are, in all your diversity. All the colors of the rainbow that you are wearing so well."

"That's so lovely and charming."

"Am I not your Prince Charming?"

As an answer Scully dropped down the brush she was still holding and get as close as she could to fully embrace Mulder, not at all taking care to mix all the dirt and stains covering both of us. They stood still for a while, hugging tightly and relishing the fortune they had to be happily together, right now.

Then, Mulder kissed the top of Scully's head and stared at their house.

"I wonder, Scully... Do we really want our house painted in white?" he asked.

"That's not the same thing," she replied.

"How that?"

"This is our beacon in the night. When we are surrounded by darkness its bright pure light is guiding and inviting us. Is welcoming us inside."

"Yeah, I agree. Moreover, it makes our house being a blank page. Waiting for us to write our own story, not on it, but inside. This white facade is the guardian of our book, of our life together. And its neutral color keeps away inquisitive people or gossipers while absorbing the memory of all our many colored secrets," Mulder concluded.


	24. X as x

**X as x**

_Nowadays - Unremarkable house_

Scully dropped down on her night table the novel she was reading then turned her head towards Mulder's. He was completely absorbed in his book, not even noticing that Scully was staring at him. She spent a few minutes scrutinizing his profile, enjoying his lightly stubbled jaw line, appreciating the intellectual look his presbyopia glasses gave him, before looking at the cover of the book he was handling.

"Really, Mulder? You're studying mathematics now?" she launched at him, surprised.

She had never seen Mulder reading that kind of books in their bed.

"I'm consolidating and improving my knowledge in this scientific field," he simply replied.

"It's not before years and years that our baby will learn that," she tested him, guessing that there must be something she wouldn't expect in his new hobby.

"Maybe it would come very soon. I'm sure our smart baby has inherited your scientific genes," he seriously declared.

"Nope. I don't buy it, Mulder."

"My sweet smart Dana... I cannot hide anything from your perceptive eyes," he shrugged while closing his book and tossing it on the floor.

He then took off his glasses and put them on his table, turned his body to his right side to face Scully and gave her a peck on her lips.

"I'm not sure you want to know the whole story," he whispered softly against her face.

"Are you kidding me? Is there some darkness in mathematics?"

"Obviously there exist strange and weird phenomena in math. For instance the so-called 'monster functions'. But no. You don't want me to speak about it in this house, and certainly not in this bed."

They stayed still for a few seconds, Scully frowning and Mulder holding her gaze.

"Aliens?" she finally asked in a bemused yet amused tone.

Mulder nodded.

"I don't bother, go ahead," she said with a smile.

Mulder inhaled deeply and sighed.

"Okay... I've decided to go back to square one with aliens. I mean... In case of an encounter of the third kind that would be friendly and courteous. I would want to communicate and share ideas through a neutral but challenging ground. A worldwide language, an almost perfect lingua franca. In math, a phrase, an expression, is either true or false. No in-betweens to hide shadows, lies, deceit, denial. In math, there's only trust and truths. It's one of the greatest achievement for humankind that is not spoiled by greediness, nor has launched wars but only spacecrafts..." he passionately explained.

He paused for a few seconds.

"Well, it's not really and completely true... but I want to believe in its purity," he added.

Scully stared at him and pondered his words.

"I guess I could agree... But, Mulder, are you intending to somehow... instigate an encounter? Kind of going back to Arecibo? Or..."

"...shhh. Stop there," he quickly interrupted as he had seen in her eyes and on her face the first signs of concern and worries.

"I assure you it remains theoretical. It won't turn into another alien obsession of mine. It's just a way to practice my logical and rational brain and to share a common ground with you. And a way to... to forget our disastrous experiences with those little greys. To have positive thoughts about our traumas... About my abduction and my death. You have noticed that I've still nightmares... I don't know, it could help..."

He made a pause and solemnly declared : "I promise I won't turn foolish. I don't want to loose you, never ever."

He shivered on his final words, but he didn't want to let gravity and heaviness sneak into their minds, not now, not in their bed. He cupped her face with his left hand, slid his thumb over her still slightly wrinkled brow, then leaned forward to kiss her forehead.

"We can talk about it tomorrow, if you want. In daylight. But right now, I don't want you to worry about me or about us," he whispered tenderly.

Then, as he saw Scully's mood changing in a lighter one, he grinned and shifted his facial expression from seriousness to playfulness.

"You don't even know what ideas mathematics have implanted in my head," he said enigmatically.

"Really?" she replied while stroking his hair. "Should I know?"

"I'm sure you'd be interested. I've been hit by the x."

"X? X as in X-Files? X as kiss? X as X rating?" she asked.

"Small x as a variable in math," he deadpanned.

She laughed. And she waited for the development and the outcome. Surely there was something in there and she was wondering where all this would lead Mulder, and them.

"So, first, let's shape the x."

Mulder removed the blanket and the sheets off their bodies and hovered over Scully. He spread her legs, kneeled between them, then spread her arms.

"You're my petite x, Scully. My unknown variable in the big and fundamental equation of my life. A so complex one that we cannot have an explicit formula for its solution, like in quintic equations as you surely knows. Therefore, the only rational method to apprehend you is to approximate you, to discover procedures allowing me to find new digits of your decimal representation each day and forever. As are doing endlessly crazy pi lovers. Me, I'm a Scully lover."

He leaned down closer to her body without crushing her, and kissed her lips while caressing her arms. Scully didn't move her limbs, just responded to his deepening kiss. She didn't want to interrupt his speech and cerebral foreplay despite her will to move her hands on his bare chest.

Breaking their kiss, he unbuttoned her pajama top then slid his mouth from hers to her belly button. He resumed his monologue while teasing her navel with his tongue and squeezing her breasts.

"I have invented the Mulder's method. A very performant one, an iterative method that converges exponentially and brings me so many digits."

Scully shivered, let out a moan then grabbed his hair with her hands.

"See? I have already caught some. All your gasps, pants, groans, moans, all your tremors, quakes, thrills are the digits I'm seeking out. Ad infinitum. All these breathes, sounds and words that you exhale are defining you in its unique way. And they are never the same, nor in the same order. I think I'll have many other interesting ones tonight, Scully. You are already so aroused," he said while pulling down her pajama pants and taking them off her legs.

He continued his journey towards her inner thighs then begun to please her with his mouth and hands, producing even more melodies and quivers.

"Mulder, I love when you're doing the math," Scully managed to say, raising Mulder's head up with her two hands and looking at him straight in his eyes. "Don't stop that fucking Mulder's method. Ever."

He smiled back at her and launched one more smart wit before leaving mathematical concepts for another occasion, another day.

"And you don't know yet the X as a random variable, Scully."


	25. Y as Yes

**Y as Yes**

These are simple words. These are simple words that she, Dana Scully, would restrain to tell him, would keep in her mouth when they were about to come out. For so many years.

Because she was assigned to debunk his work and criticize his theories. Because she was a fierce woman in a world of men, because she's an independent mind. Because she wouldn't let an equal partner give her orders or decide what she had to do.

And when he became more than a partner but a friend, when she could trust him with all her heart, she would keep not pronouncing these words.

Because she hadn't feel the need to reassure him by them, because their non verbal communication would speak loud and clear and would be enough.

Finally, when she was lost and confused by her sentiments, when she had hard time to define what was precisely their relationship, she would lock and hide these words in a vault and behind walls.

Because she was afraid of their consequences, because she wasn't ready to tell him, to whisper them in his ear, to confess these simple words.

'Yes.' 'Yes, Mulder.' 'Yes. Yes. Yes.'

These are sweet words. These are sweet words that he, Fox Mulder, had gained, had earned and had deserved to hear. After so many years seeking them.

Because he wanted to be listened to and taken seriously, because he wanted to be considered otherwise than Spooky.

And when she became someone he would care of and who was taking care of him as well, when she was the friend he never had, he needed to be reassured by these words.

Because he was still so vulnerable, because he wanted to be loved for what he was. Because he wanted to believe he was worth to work with, to spend time with, to share theories and comfort with.

Finally, when he knew he had completely fell for her, he had patiently waited for her to confess these simple words of love.

He had been rewarded one night in his bed when she had awakened him, putting her soft lips on his and her warm hands on his bare skin. He then had asked her a few questions and she had answered.

'Scully, is that you?' 'Are you sure that it is what you want?' 'Would you mind if I switch the light on? Can I taste you there? Is that good?'

'Yes.' 'Yes, Mulder.' 'Yes. Yes. Yes.'

Decades later they are standing against the wooden railing of their porch. They are watching the sun setting, amazed by the outstanding colors and the scenery. She's settled in his embrace, her back against his torso, their legs and arms entwined and her head resting on his shoulder. He's holding her tightly and close to his heart, and right now he wishes he could stop time, make minutes last hours.

As the crepuscular light makes her hair glow as if they were from another world, he leans his head down to tease the soft spot of her neck with his lips and he slides his hands under her shirt.

Because he has learned for years how to make her pronounce these sweet simple words. Because he would never get tired to hear them, softly whispered in his ears.

And there on the porch, as the day ends in flamboyant colors, as he caresses her breasts the way she loves, as he rubs his groin against her back and kisses and licks her skin, she closes her eyes and murmurs almost inaudibly: "Yes. Yes, Mulder. Yes. Yes. Yes."


	26. Z as Zoom Out

**Z as Zoom Out**

I'd want to start standing in their bedroom, zooming in on their bed, zooming in on their intertwined naked bodies.

It's a warm summer night and they have made love a little moment ago. They are now quietly sleeping, lying on their right sides, his tall body spooning her little one.

No need to have witnessed what had happened just before, no need to intrude into this specific intimacy, no need to have observed their shared gestures of tenderness and passion.

Because all the clues are here in front of our eyes, if you know how to find and read them.

Zoom in on their left hands. His is recovering hers. Their fingers are loosely interlaced. You can guess that before relaxing their hands were tightly squeezed together. Because the weight and the essence of their relationship has crystallized into that simple intimate gesture. Because since they have renewed their shared lives they wouldn't fall asleep without holding hands, each night still amazed that they are reunited forever. If you look even closely and study their positions like a forensic expert, you would conclude that his thumb had been softly rubbing in circles the spot between her thumb and her index finger. That the stubborn and relentless love for her wouldn't let him stop to gently smooth her skin there until oblivion into sleep.

Move along their arms and settle on their heads. You cannot see his face, buried in her disheveled red hair, breathing in her scent. Maybe you could discern a smile formed by the corner of his mouth and you could speculate that he's dreaming of her right now. Then, linger on her face. You can easily read on it the peacefulness, the trust, the bliss. Analyzing the way she has rested her head against his shoulder you conclude that she wouldn't want to be in another place than there, settled in his arms and chest. That he's her shield against the darkness and the sad memories, that he's her home for the rest of their lives together.

Zoom out. They have age spots on their hands and wrinkles on their faces but you're marveling at the beauty of their bodies despite all the scars, at their healthy shapes despite all the past ordeals. You can be sure that their lovemaking was intense and passionate, that they wouldn't give up lust and fire in their intercourses for a lukewarm gentle routine. As long as they would be able to. They have left all the evidence of their crime everywhere in the room. The clothes, the sheets, the secretions, the stains. And the air, so much loaded and intoxicated by their previous sexual ecstasy that you cannot decently stay here much longer.

I stepped back and leave the bedroom. Leave them in their stronghold, leave them in their unfathomable intimacy. Leaving them in this unearthly relationship that I would never have a complete access to, even using thousands of words and imagination.

I move towards the other bedroom. The door is ajar and if you poke your head inside you immediately smell innocence and infancy. You wouldn't risk to step into the room and zoom in on a miracle. Because they obviously possess an internal radar, because you're sure that as soon as you put a foot inside the precious room you are surrounded by two berserk parents pointing guns at your face -if not a much worse scenario for your own safety. And if so you wouldn't blame them for that, you would only admire their team work in play.

What's left to do is climbing down the stairs, then taking in the ground floor of their unremarkable house. Finding proofs of a normal family life, of daily happiness. You would also want to wander into his small office, sending you vivid memories of a famous basement office. Maybe you would be disappointed by the lack of weirdness and madness in the room. Because maturity has made him grow and change. Because since she has settled back in the house he's been keeping his demons at bay. You just wish and can't wait for the book he might be writing, exposing decades of investigation into the spooky fringes of our rational world. You also would be frustrated by her files, reports and articles that you would find, her actual work seemingly so banal, dealing with conventional science and standard medical practice. But don't be fooled. They still have the guts and the minds, ideals and dedication to the truth and justice, and they would be able to fight and resist for the sake of humanity in a sec if and when needed.

I'm going outside underneath a starry sky and appreciate the quietness of the simple place they have chosen to settle down. How could imagine that two romantic super heroes are living here? I know, you know, we know. We want to believe that this place really exists, that they are real and that we could count on them to free us from all the madness and darkness taking hold of the year 2020.

Zoom out. Zoom out.

I'm moving up in the sky and I'm traveling through space and across the Ocean. I'm back home far away, my fingers dancing on the keyboard and I want to keep part of them in my heart. Beyond words, forever.

* * *

Notes:

It's been more than one year since I've started to write this story made of independent chapters. When I've begun I had no plan at all, just the idea of browsing through the alphabet. I've started in a kind of limbo not knowing when it might be happening in the lifetime of M&S. Soon I've settled in a vague post Season 11 time, at first not acknowledging the existence of their baby, then finally mentioning lightly this fact.

I hope I've made some progress in my writing since my first chapters. Recall English is not my native language and that most of my work had had no beta reading. I apologize for any ugly errors and terrible twists of the language I could have made.

I'm not sure I'd continue in the path of writing XF fanfic (beyond the Case Files Exchange I'm currently involved in), wanting to leave M&S for a while and turning back to my native language I can so much more tame and control. But I don't know yet if I'd be able to do that. Because I might have turned into an addict. Time will tell.

Thanks for all the people that have read me and leave comments. I appreciate very much and I'm completely grateful for any comment you could send to me.


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